


The Nightmares

by storiesinthedark



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magical Realism, Alternate Universe - Witchcraft, Anal Sex, Blow Jobs, Boys Kissing, Broken Bones, Dreams and Nightmares, Everyone still skates, M/M, Major Character Injury, Masturbation, Past Relationship(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-01
Updated: 2018-03-01
Packaged: 2019-03-25 07:08:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 24,141
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13829064
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/storiesinthedark/pseuds/storiesinthedark
Summary: Victor is twenty-one and just as he is about to land his last jump of his fourth World Championship, he miscalculates his landing and hears a crack as he blacks out on the ice. He wakes up in the hospital several hours later with a cast on his foot and no recollection of what happened. And that’s when the nightmares start. They appear every time he closes his eyes and they haunt him even when he’s awake. But, amidst all of the nightmares he keeps having there is one in particular that fascinates him. He keeps dreaming about a young boy with messy black hair and glasses. Even after he recovers and is no longer taking the painkillers, he keeps dreaming about this boy, until one day he meets him.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> The fic would not have been possible without the amazing support of my beta, [pursuitofnerdiness.](http://archiveofourown.org/users/pursuitofnerdiness/pseuds/pursuitofnerdiness) She really helped take this fic from garbage fire to present and I couldn't be more thankful. 
> 
> Also, thank you so much to my artist, wolvenflower. You can see the beautiful artwork for this Big Bang on Ice [here.](http://wolvenflower.tumblr.com/post/171390188845/piece-%C2%BD-for-bigbangonice-fic-link-to-be)

It happens almost instantly. Victor can feel the disappointment the moment he’s left the ice. It’s his second to last jump during his fourth Senior World Championships and he knows he’s fucked it up the moment he takes off. He knows it won’t be a clean landing and may cost him points. But, he doesn’t anticipate the sickening, crunching sound of his ankle snapping as he misses the outside edge of his skate and comes crashing down on the ice, hitting his head in the process. The pain radiates up his leg and spine and he tries not to scream. He tries to stand, but the pain is too much. He lays on the ice, the cold surface providing a little relief and soon he finds himself being lulled to sleep by its comfort. There are voices almost immediately after, but he can’t make them out; can’t distinguish one from another. He doesn’t remember anything else. Just the sound of voices and everything going dark. 

The beeping of the vitals monitor is the first thing he notices when he comes to. A steady beeping sound that keeps the time of his body. He honestly doesn’t remember anything after hearing his ankle snap. He’s not one of those people who hallucinated seeing people from his past. He doesn’t have enough people from his past to conjure hallucinations. For as long as he can remember it’s always been him, some of the other Russian skaters, and Yakov.

He opens his eyes and takes in the white walls of the room. It’s sparse with only a chair in the corner and a small table to his right. He’s alone. He takes a deep breath and relaxes, the dripping of some mysterious fluid into an IV bag providing a comforting rhythm. He starts to close his eyes again, to let sleep take over once more when a woman dressed light blue scrubs enters the room.

She smiles when she notices him eyeing her warily. “It’s good to see you awake, Mr. Nikiforov,” she says. “You had a rather nasty fall. Worried a fair number of people.” 

He nods and smiles sheepishly. He tries to use his arms to help him sit up further, only to discover them trapped with medical tubing, so he resigns himself to his current position. “I hadn’t intended to. A slight miscalculation on my part.” 

She crosses the room to look at the monitors that have been giving off the steady beeping noises and then back to his other side to check on the IV. Victor’s eyes follow her every move. She scribbles something down on the clipboard she had been carrying and nods.

“Everything looks good here,” she says. “How are you feeling? Any pain?” 

Victor takes a quick analysis of his limbs. Nothing feels out of the ordinary. Even his broken ankle is aligned correctly and the pain is currently manageable. He tells the nurse as such and she smiles before leaving him alone once more. 

The silence begins to eat at him. It’s never been this quiet before. Even when he’s at home by himself with only Makkachin--his train of thought veers sideways--where was Makkachin now? Who was watching her? Maybe he shouldn’t have brought her all the way to Japan with him...she was just a puppy after all. Would Yakov even know how to take care of her? Panic begins to flood through Victor as he searches for his phone. He knows he didn’t have it on him when he was skating, it would have been with Yakov, but he has no idea if Yakov would have left it with him after he had been admitted. His breathing increases and it triggers the alarm on his vitals machines. 

As the nurse rushes in, he tries to calm himself. Deep breathes over and over again, but it’s not helping. He needs his phone. He needs to know what’s happening with his beloved puppy.

“What’s wrong?” The nurse asks in rapid English while checking all of his vitals. She pulls a syringe from a drawer in the cart she wheeled in when she came running, uncaps it, and dispenses the liquid into Victor’s IV. 

“My dog,” Victor manages to get out. “My phone.” 

The nurse looks at him confused for a moment before saying. “I’m sorry, sir. All of your personal belongings are here. You didn’t have much when you were brought in.” 

Victor’s taking short shallow breaths now, and he manages to nod in acknowledgment. Tears begin to streak down his face, he doesn’t want them to, but they can’t be helped. He hopes that someone is taking care of his dog while he’s confined to a bed in the hospital for monitoring. 

His vision begins to wobble, and within a few moment, his breathing evens out as he falls asleep. Worry be damned.

  
  
  


The world around Victor looks soft and light blue. It’s vaguely familiar, but he can’t quite seem to place where he would have seen it before. It reminds him of the ice rink from when he was a kid, so he assumes that’s where he is and he doesn’t try terribly hard to figure it out any further. Instead, he looks down at his feet to his ice skates that have magically appeared on his feet. The blades aren’t gold, but they fit his feet just fine, so Victor begins stroking around the ice in the light blue emptiness. He feels weightless as he makes his first jump on the ice, a Triple Salchow. 

He doesn’t know how long he’s been skating, but his feet feel heavy as his makes another jump, this one a Double Axel instead of his usual Triple. He looks around the rink for an exit and that’s when he notices that there is no way on or off of the ice. He skates to the rink wall and all the way around it to double check, but it’s just as he feared. He’s stuck. 

“Hello!” He screams, the sound of his own voice echoing off the walls, but no one returns his call. 

“Victor!” Yakov calls in response. “Get off the ice. They need to set-up for the medal ceremony.” 

“What?” He asks, skating to the rinkside, stepping off the ice. He looks down and he’s dressed in his costume from his first time at the top of the podium, black pants and a red puffy shirt with gold embroidery. He’s thirteen again, and Victor remembers this moment. This was his first major win. A major win that would shoot him from a nobody to Russia’s national hero.

But, there’s something different right now. They call his name to stand at the top of the podium and he slowly and awkwardly makes his way. Standing at the top of the podium, he looks out over the crowd, everyone cheering for him and his fellow competitors, and finds Yakov slowly clapping and nodding his head in recognition. He forces a smile and that’s when he sees her, staring at him. A beautiful woman, no older than eighteen, in a long black dress with orange hair. He definitely does not remember her.

She smiles at him, and he feels like his heart is breaking in two and one of those pieces is disintegrating. Logically he knows organs and bodies don’t work that way, but he can’t help but feel a hole beginning to form. He gently clutches at his heart so as not to make a scene. He knows Yakov will reprimand him if he does. 

And then almost as suddenly as everything appeared around him, it all vanishes. The podium is gone, the cheering fans have disappeared and Victor is wearing his black t-shirt and grey sweatpants again. He’s alone. He’s always alone and Victor can’t help but let this thought go as he skates to the center of the rink and lays down on the ice. The cold seeps through his shirt and he stares up at the light blue all around him. He closes his eyes for a moment and when he reopens them the ice rink has vanished. The world is now a soft pale green and the cold that had seeped into his t-shirt is immediately replaced by a feeling of warm, soft grass. He closes his eyes again, allowing the warm grass to lull him into a light sleep.

“Victor,” a soft, deep voice says. It’s familiar and he’s trying with all his might to place why he knows this voice.  “Victor, open your eyes. Please, darling. Please.” And then it hits him. The voice belongs to Ilia. Ilia Kuznetsov. He hasn’t seen Ilia in years. 

Victor finally opens his eyes and there hovering above him, mere inches away from his face are piercing green eyes, a mop of untamed brown hair, and a smile that used to make Victor’s heart melt. He smiles, uncomfortable at how close Ilia is to him, and sits up, forcing Ilia to adjust and sit instead of hovering over Victor. Ilia still smiles, as he sits cross-legged on the grass. 

“Hello,” Victor says, his voice shaking as it leaves his throat. It’s only a word, a small word, but the moment the word escapes, he wishes he could swallow it again. 

“Hello, my darling,” Ilia replies. “Did you have a nice nap?” 

Victor looks around at the soft green world, only the blades of grass beneath him and Ilia have any definition. He has no idea where he is. “How are you...why are you here?” He manages to get out, not making any eye contact. 

“What are you talking about? We came here on vacation, remember. Yakov finally let you go. Said I needed to return you in a week in the same condition that I borrowed you in.” 

Victor does remember. He remembers that vacation with Ilia had not gone terribly well. He had been seventeen and he had argued with Yakov for nearly two weeks about how he should be able to go on vacation when he felt like it because after all, Yakov wasn’t his father. Yakov had argued that taking a vacation that close to the start of the skating season was asking for the press to question his dedication; he conveniently left out the argument that he didn’t approve of Ilia, who was three years older than Victor at the time. 

They had gone to the beach, Lazurnaya Bay, on the entire other side of the country. A ten-hour flight just to get as far away as possible from Yakov and skating. They spent almost every day walking along the beach, holding hands, and making out every chance they got. That was until the night they went out dancing at Abordage and Victor found Ilia in the arms of a very beautiful orange-haired woman. 

They argued, Ilia claiming that it was nothing, but Victor was seventeen and emotional, and he couldn’t see beyond his own pained heart. He left Ilia in their hotel room, taking his duffle bag with him and fleeing to the beach. Victor walked along the sand by himself, his bare feet crunching in the sand as he approached the water. He dipped his toes in and the water, which had felt cold earlier in the day, didn’t feel that way at all. It was inviting as if it were asking him to drown away all of his sorrows. He took a deep breath and exhaled, letting the ocean air clear his mind. He wouldn’t let Yakov be right about this vacation; about Ilia. Instead, he looked up at the stars and wished for his heart to mend itself quickly and for no other man to break it as Ilia had. The waves picked up gently, sparkling in various colors, and Victor took that as a sign that the stars had heard his wish. He smiled, returned to his forgotten duffle bag and grabbed the next cab he could find to the airport. 

He returned to St. Petersburg alone and heartbroken. Yakov had picked him up at the airport, and while he didn’t say anything, Victor could feel the “I told you so” that hung between them. 

That’s the reason he’s so unsure and hesitant now. He’s sitting in the grass with Ilia who doesn’t seem to remember they aren’t together; who doesn’t remember leaving Victor for someone else.

“Victor?” Ilia questions, when Victor’s face begins to contort with a puzzled expression. “Victor?” 

 

 

“Victor,” a voice that isn’t Ilia’s says. The voice is deeper and Victor recognizes it almost instantly. It’s Yakov. “Victor.” 

“Yakov,” Victor mumbles, the name slurring in his mouth. 

A pressure weighs on Victor’s shoulder. “Victor,” Yakov says again. 

And then, just like that, Victor sits straight up in the hospital bed, gasping for air. His breathing is erratic and he can’t yet focus on his surroundings, but he’s sure of at least one thing, everything he can see is in focus and isn’t a blob of color. There’s a slight pain shooting up his arm and he realizes that it’s from the pull of the medical tubing in his arm, so he carefully repositions himself in the hospital bed. 

“You’re here,” Victor says once he’s no longer in pain. A dream. Everything with Ilia was a dream Victor realizes, but he’s still on edge as Yakov is now in his hospital room.

“Yes, where else did you think I’d be?” Yakov says. He’s sitting in the only chair in Victor’s room. He hasn’t taken his big blue coat off, but he has at least managed to hang his hat and scarf on the arm of the chair. 

“I wasn’t sure,” Victor says slowly. “On a plane back to St. Petersburg. Maybe training with Georgi or little Mila. You have plenty of students who are perfectly healthy.” 

Yakov sighs. “Lilia is flying back with them. They will survive without me for one day.” 

Victor smiles and relaxes, the tension he hadn’t realized was pulling at his neck and jawline melting away. He closes his eyes and then Yakov starts speaking to him again. 

“Silly boy. The doctor said that it’s just a fractured ankle. They did emergency surgery the moment you arrived. A few weeks in a cast, some physical therapy, and you should be back on the ice soon. You’re lucky you aren’t showing signs of a concussion with the way you hit your head,” Yakov says. 

There’s a silence that settles between them and it hangs around until the nurse returns, pushing her squeaky cart in with her. This isn’t the same nurse, Victor notes, this nurse is wearing red scrubs instead of blue ones like the last one. 

“Good afternoon, Mr. Nikiforov. How are you feeling?” She says, her English heavily accented. 

“Fine,” Victor replies. “My ankle has a little bit of pain, but I guess that’s to be expected.” 

The nurse smiles. “Yes. It should go away soon, I’m giving you some more pain medication. You should be ready for discharge tomorrow. The doctor would like to keep you for one more day of observation just to make sure your head is fine.” 

Yakov nods and Victor says, “Ok,” as the nurse putters over to his IV and dispenses a syringe full of clear liquid into the medical tubing on his hand.

“You’ll feel better soon. Call if you need anything,” she says as she returns to her cart and leaves the room. 

There’s another brief silence, but then Yakov speaks. “We’ll leave the day after tomorrow. Give you a little bit more time to recover before the long flight back to St. Petersburg,” he says adjusting himself in the chair. 

“Ok,” Victors says. His eyelids are feeling heavy again and as hard as he’s trying to keep himself awake to talk with Yakov, he gives into the feeling and within minutes he’s asleep again. 

  
  
  


Everything around him is misty and grey and Victor immediately dislikes it. He looks around cautiously before a lightning bolt illuminates the sky and a crash of thunder can be heard, and he tenses, eyes wide as he looks around for a place to hide. 

“It’s ok Victor,” a woman’s voice in the distance says. “You’ll be ok.” He doesn’t recognize it and before he has time to think about anything else, another crash of lightning brings everything into sharp focus for a moment and in the distance, Victor sees a small cottage. He can’t think of a better place to wait out the storm, so he takes off at a quick pace, hoping beyond all reason that either the door to the cottage is open or the inhabitant will let him in. 

When he reaches the door, finally, after running what feels like six miles, but he knows it can’t possibly actually be that far, he turns the doorknob and as luck would have it, the door swings open. 

“Hello?” Victor asks as he steps inside, sweeping the mist from his Russian National jacket. 

“Hello,” a voice responds, and as Victor ventures further into the house, he finds that the voice is attached to a woman with long orange hair and amber eyes. She looks vaguely familiar, but he can’t put his finger on where he’s seen her before, so he doesn’t bother. She’s wearing a black robe and is sweeping the floor in the kitchen. “Finally. That one took long enough to take hold.” The woman stops sweeping. 

“I’m sorry? What?” Victor replies. “Who are you?” 

“It’s unimportant,” she replies. “You’re here now and that’s what matters.” And then she vanishes right before Victor’s eyes. 

Victor knows what he just witnessed, and he’s certain that can’t happen in real life, but before he has any more time to contemplate what he just saw, lightning crashes again and this time, to Victor’s worst fear, it strikes the cottage. 

The flames begin in the kitchen, of course, and they spread quicker than any fire Victor has ever seen. He tries to run to the nearest door, the front one, to escape, only for the door to be blocked by fire when he opens it. 

“Take my hand,” a voice says to him when he opens the back door and sees flames. 

“What?” Victor breathes out. 

“Take my hand!” The voice yells. 

“Ok,” Victor says, though he isn’t sure what’s going on. He reaches out toward the flames and a hand grabs hold of him and he’s being pulled through the fire. He lands on the other side of the fire and catches a glimpse of the man that the hand is attached to just before he vanishes, jet black hair, brown eyes behind glasses, and a smile that’s uncertain, but Victor finds it adorable. 

Something grabs a hold of him and he’s being shaken back and forth, but Victor can’t see the invisible force. 

“Victor! Victor! Wake up!” It’s Yakov voice once again, and the world around Victor begins to crumble. 

He wakes up panting, his heart racing. Yakov is by his side, brushing the hair from his forehead. “Deep breaths,” Yakov repeats. “Calm down. You’re ok. You’re ok.” 

Victor takes comfort in the sound of Yakov’s voice, and he takes deep breaths just as Yakov says. Within a few moments, his breathing has returned to normal and Yakov had returned to the chair. 

“Thank you,” Victor mumbles. 

“You’re welcome,” Yakov replies. 

And the silence that often fills the lulls between their conversation resumes. 

  
  
  


The doctor is the first person into his room the next morning. Victor hasn’t slept since he woke up from the dream about the fire, but he’s not feeling tired. This is the doctor who has been taking care of Victor for the last three days and Victor can count on one hand the number of times he’s actually met him. Doctor Ikezawa is shorter than Victor with black hair, brown eyes and a white lab coat over a blue button down and purple tie. It’s not a look Victor would have picked out, but he doesn’t make any comments on it. As he finishes listening to Victor’s heartbeat, he pulls out his flashlight and runs it by his eyes, making Victor follow the light with his eyes. 

“Everything seems to be working properly,” he says, clicking the light off. “Once the nurse has all of the paperwork in order, you’ll be discharged. Do you have any questions for me?” 

“How long until I can get back to skating?” Victor asks. He’s afraid he already knows the answer, but he wants to double check as much as he can. 

“Ten weeks at the bare minimum. That’s when the cast will come off. Once you’re back in Russia, in two weeks you’ll need to go see a doctor to have the stitches removed and for a short cast to be put on instead of the splint. And then it’s eight weeks in the short cast and then physical therapy,” Doctor Ikezawa replies. 

“That’s what I thought,” Victor sighs. 

“It will take time, but you’ll be back to your old self soon,” Doctor Ikezawa says. “I have no doubt you’ll be breaking records again soon, Mr. Nikiforov.” He waits for Victor to nod that he’s understood and then he leaves.

Victor lays back on the hospital bed. He’s bored and tired of being here, especially since Yakov didn’t bring him any books to read and the television shows are all in Japanese. He’s exhausted as he didn’t sleep last night, but he’s afraid to let himself fall back asleep and have another bad dream. 

He groans and closes his eyes, brown eyes behind glasses flash in Victor’s mind and Victor relaxes, and within minutes he’s lightly dozing, the presence of his savior comforting him. 

“I know you’re awake. Stop pretending and let’s get ready to go,” Yakov says not even a minute after Victor closes his eyes. He’s not using English, so Victor knows he’s exhausted. “The nurse is preparing the paperwork now.” 

Victor thinks Yakov sounds a little sad like he knows that the next few months will be miserable, but he’s not sure if he’s making that up, so he doesn’t say anything. Instead, he opens his eyes, nods, and then stretches what he can as he’s still attached to all of the equipment. He’s grateful to be heading home, so he waits patiently for the nurse, Yakov hovering in the doorway. He’ll be home soon, he tells himself. He’ll be home soon.


	2. Chapter 2

The nightmares Victor keeps having aren’t always the same. His brain likes to keep things interesting like that, bringing up old fears or memories that he’d long thought he’d forgotten and then occasionally throwing in something random to make the whole situation just absurd. Last night seemed to be no different.

As Victor groggily rubs the crust from his eyes, his vision still fuzzy and soft around the edges, he pushes away the image of his most recent ex-boyfriend, Michael, leaving him stranded and driving off in his brand new mini-cooper with a spider as his new lover. He sighs, at least this nightmare had more of the ridiculous elements to it than some of the others he’s been having. He could never imagine himself driving a mini-cooper after all. 

It’s not his fault, really. The nightmares are coming as the price of the painkillers he pops to keep the pain of his fractured ankle at bay. The doctor had said before he left the hospital in Japan that side effects of vivid dreams were possible, he just hadn’t thought it would be an every night occurrence. He thinks he shouldn’t be surprised. His time in hospital was plagued with weird dreams, from the painkillers they were injecting into his IV, he assumes, but he would have thought these painkillers were something a little different from the stuff administered by the nurses.  He wouldn’t take them if he could, but the one time he tried to sleep with only Nurofen meant that he was up every two hours when the pain returned, and he knows Chris will stop answering his phone if he spends another night texting him incessantly demanding a reply. 

He’s been back home for three weeks now and he’s restless. He wouldn’t have thought of himself as not being able to sit still, until, of course, he was forced to not move, and Yakov is making him stick to that. He’s not even allowed to walk or rather limp past the skating rink. Hell, he’s not really even allowed to limp from the bedroom to the kitchen, but that doesn’t stop him from trying before getting yelled at for doing so when one of Yakov’s minions stops by to check on him.

Victor sighs as he slowly hobbles his way out of his bedroom and into the living room, where he unceremoniously flops onto the couch before realizing he forgot to grab breakfast before doing so. He groans as his stomach growls, and just as he is about to push himself up from the couch, the door to his apartment opens and Georgi, his rinkmate and the most common of Yakov’s minions, appears. 

“Are you feeling any better today?” He asks with a smile, reaching down to pet Makkachin who has bounded over to the door. 

“No,” Victor says as he lets himself fall back onto the couch. 

“I’m sorry,” he responds. “Yakov says you’ll be back on the ice soon enough.” 

He sighs. “He says that, but he won’t even let me near the rink.” 

“It because he knows you’ll try and put your skates on,” he says, rolling her eyes. “I can see it now, you trying to only skate on one foot because you can’t get the other skate over the cast.”

Victor doesn’t respond. He watches as Georgi stands up from petting Makkachin and heads into the kitchen to put the bag of groceries he’s carrying away into the cabinets.

“You didn’t eat breakfast again,” Georgi said, rolling his eyes again. 

Victor shrugs. “I forgot and then I sat down and I haven’t gotten back up. Could you just bring me some of the porridge from the refrigerator? You don’t even have to heat it up. I’ll eat it cold.” His stomach growls again.

Georgi scoops some of the porridge found in the refrigerator into a bowl and hands it over to Victor, but only after he’s made sure to put away all of the groceries he’s been carrying. 

“Thank you,” Victor responds, immediately shoving a spoonful into his mouth. His stomach gurgles at the intrusion of the food, and Victor hums in satisfaction.

“Do you need anything else while I’m here?” Georgi asks, stepping into the living room from the kitchen. 

“I don’t think so. Thank you for all your help, Georgi. I know you’re doing it because Yakov says to, but I really do appreciate it.” 

Georgi nods. “You should just be glad that you broke your ankle at the end of last season. You’ll be back at the rink before the start of next season. But you’ll definitely have some competition. I’ll be ready for you.” And with those parting words, he leaves Victor alone once again in his apartment. 

He finishes the porridge quickly and then flops against the back of the couch and groans. His foot is propped up on his coffee table because he remembers he’s supposed to do that, but he’s bored. Even if Georgi was annoying and only there because Yakov insisted, he was still happy to talk with someone. After a few minutes, which seemed to go on forever, Victor reaches into his pocket and pulls out his mobile. He knows Chris probably isn’t awake yet, but he needs some kind of contact. Any kind of contact. 

‘HELP!,’ the message reads. He hopes Chris will respond sooner rather than later, and almost as if by magic, mere minutes after he’s sent the message, his phone rings. 

“What’s wrong?” Chris’ smooth voice on the other end of the phone says. 

“I don’t know how much longer I can do this,” Victor responds. 

“You’ve only been off the ice for three weeks,” Chris responds. 

“I know. And I’m already losing my mind. The only people I see are Georgi, Alexei, Evgenia, Lilia, and Yakov,” he says, throwing his against the back of the couch. He closes his eyes, listening. 

Chris chuckles. “So basically the entire Russian skating team except for the juniors.” 

He opens his eyes and scoffs, but then a shadow of a woman in the corner of the room catches his attention. “You need to come...” Victor trails off. 

“What?” Chris asks. “I need to what?” 

“Sorry, sorry. I thought I saw someone,” Victor says, looking around his apartment. “I was saying that you need to come save me.” 

“Ah. No,” Chris replies. “I don’t want Yakov to murder me. I have so much to live for.” 

“You do not.” 

“Yes, I do. Mr. Right is out there somewhere and I’m not letting your inability to listen to your coach prevent me from finding him because I’m dead.” 

Victor bursts out into laughter. “That is the dumbest excuse for not helping I’ve ever heard. 

“Fine, how about I’m in Switzerland and I’m not flying six and a half hours to save you.” 

“It’s only three if you fly non-stop,” Victor counters. 

“That doesn’t make it better. I’m not flying even three hours in coach with the risk of crying children. The answer is still no,” Chris says.

“You’re no fun!” Victor complains. 

“I’ll see you next season,” Chris says. “I’ll be tons of fun then.” 

And then the line goes dead. Victor stares down at his red phone and flips it shut. That conversation didn’t go as he had planned. Now, who was going to help spring him from this hell? 

He taps his fingers on the couch and then reaches for his phone again. This time, he opens the contacts and just as he is about to select ‘Overlord’, which is code for Yakov, from the list, he gets a text from the man himself. He opens it and it reads, ‘The answer to whatever you’re thinking about is no.’ When did Yakov learn to read minds?

‘You don’t even know what I was going to ask!’ Victor texts back, and he receives another one a few moments later in response. ‘No. You can’t come to the rink just to sit and watch the others skate,’ the message reads. Yes, Yakov really had learned to read minds. That or Georgi had said something to him when he went for practice. 

He throws the phone back to the coffee table and stares around the apartment. There really is nothing to do in his godforsaken apartment, so he picks up the TV remote that he had discarded on the coffee table yesterday in a fit of boredom and settles for flipping through channels until he finally settles on a documentary about otters. Makkachin joins him on the couch once he’s finally settled and not moving around. 

Makkachin is warm on his lap and the documentary is more boring than other documentaries he’s seen this week, so it’s no surprise that within half an hour, Victor finds that his eyelids are too heavy to stay open.

  
  
  


When he opens his eyes, the world around him is thick with fog swirling across the water. He thinks it looks to be a pond from all of the rocks around the edge of the water. He walks forward, intending to dip his toes in the water, and the fog dissipates slightly, allowing him to see that in the water there is someone, a young boy with dark hair and glasses. The boy’s eyes are shut, and he doesn’t appear to be wearing anything, but Victor feels like he’s seen this boy before though he can’t place where. The boy breathes deeps and his muscles relax in the water, and Victor feels a rush of sensation toward his dick. Victor thinks he’s the most beautiful boy he’s ever seen. 

Victor approaches closer still, this time dipping his toes in the water. It’s warm, which Victor wasn’t expecting.  “Hello,” Victor says, smiling. 

The boy opens his eyes and blinks at Victor. “Hello?” The boy says, his eyes widen as he looks Victor up and down.

“Hello,”  Victor says, looking around to make sure the boy isn’t speaking to someone else. “I’m Victor. Who are you?”

The boy doesn’t answer, instead, he says, “How did you get here?”

“I don’t know,” Victor replies, he sits down on one of the rocks and dunks his whole foot into the water. The ache that has persisted in the arch of his foot ever since he first set foot on the ice as a kid starts to disappear. “I was watching TV and then suddenly I was here.” 

“That’s strange,” the boy replies, and then almost as quickly as he appeared, the world shifts and suddenly Victor is sitting in a park and the sky is a brilliant shade of violet. He stares up at the moon, brown eyes haunting his thoughts. He feels a pressure on his right hand, so he looks to his right, and sitting next to him wearing his competition sweats is Chris. Chris winks at him and laces their fingers together. 

“It’s a beautiful night,” Chris says, his voice as smooth as chocolate and Victor is afraid that he’ll drown in it. “And I had a really great time. Maybe, if I’m lucky enough we can do this again.” 

Victor’s eyes go wide as he takes in Chris’ wide toothy smile. He’s been in this exact situation before. Why is his brain showing him this? He and Chris are just friends. They decided that last year when Victor turned 20 and couldn’t stop talking about Joseph, the American ski instructor from Colorado that was vacationing in Russia. He shivered. He was lucky Chris still wanted to be his friend after how he treated him. 

“Do you want to go back to my place?” Chris purred, running his hand up and down Victor’s arm. It started off as a soft feeling and quickly turned to feelings of pins and needles running along his arm. He tries to pull his arm away, but it’s paralyzed. 

“Chris?” Victor asks, his voice weary, but gentle. “Why can’t I move my arm?” 

“Oh,” Chris replies. “I’m sorry Victor. I couldn’t help myself.” He lifts his hand off of Victor’s arm and a purple-silver liquid drips from his fingernails, which are sharpened to points like claws. 

“Chris? What’s happening to me?” Victor breathes as he feels the warmth begin to travel up his arm and his heart begins to beat in steady thumps. 

  
  
  


Thump. Thump. Thump. He awakes with a start, his breath catching in his throat. Makkachin’s weight is heavy in his lap, and while it’s usually a comfort, right now it feels as though his entire body has been paralyzed. He struggles against her until she finally moves, whining at the loss, and he begins to breathe normally, the thumping noise that awoke him, still continuing on his apartment door.

He eyes the door wearily and then hoists himself up on his crutches and opens the door to find a small, ten-year-old Mila accompanied by Yakov at the door. The world is glowing a little behind them, but Victor doesn’t say anything. He’s sure he’s just groggy from the nap. 

“Well, this is a surprise,” Victor says looking between Mila and Yakov. “I was only expecting one of you. Come in if you must.” 

“That’s alright. We won’t be here long, we were on our way home.” Yakov stares at Victor. “You don’t look well,” he says, the same deadpan inflection in his voice as always. 

“I’m fine,” Victor says, but he knows the moment the words leave his mouth that Yakov knows he’s lying. “About as fine as you can be when your ankle is broken.” 

“No, you’re not. You haven’t been sleeping,” Yakov says.

Victor doesn’t say anything, and instead sighs. 

“I know you aren’t going to want to do this,” Yakov says. “But, I think you should see someone about it. You need to sleep.”

“No,” Victor says, his voice harsh. He thinks better of his tone after he’s said it and Mila flinches. “No, I’m not seeing someone. It’s just the side effects of the medicine. It’ll go away once my ankle isn’t broken.”

Yakov breathes slowly, his eyes trained on Victor. “Alright. We’ll do what you want. We should go.” 

“Ok,” Victor replies. 

“Goodbye, Victor,” Yakov says over Mila mumbling what Victor can only assume is a goodbye as well.

“Goodbye,” Victor says, shutting the door behind him and returning to the couch. 

He’s alone again. 


	3. Chapter 3

 

The first step onto the ice is shaky at best and eventually, it leads to Victor sliding penguin style across the ice at worst. It’s been three months and Victor  _ can tell _ . He’s only doing simple one-foot glides and simple spirals and his balance are all off. He’s never had a problem being on the ice. Never. And now, for some reason he can’t fathom, his right foot, his landing foot, is refusing to cooperate. 

The random apparitions that continue to appear out of the corner of his eyes aren’t helping also aren’t helping, he’s definitely sure of that. He thought for sure the nightmares and the hallucinations would have stopped once he stopped taking the painkillers, but that does not seem to be true. Today he’s being plagued by a dark shadow person who is content to hang on the side of the rink wall. 

“You need to build the muscle back up again,” Yakov says to him, standing on the side of the rink in his large black puffy coat, his arms crossed over his chest. Victor had just attempted a Double Lutz and fallen. “You’ve been going to physical therapy like we talked about, yes?” 

“Yes,” Victor huffs back as he pulls himself up from the ice. “It’s not helping.” 

“Yes, it is. You’ve only been back on the ice for two days. You need to take it easy. You can’t expect to be back to normal right away.” 

“But, I  _ need _ to be! What about my programs?” 

“You may have to adjust them. For the time being at least. Victor, we can’t take any chances of your re-injuring your ankle. If you do, you may never skate again. Is that what you want?"

Victor sighs. “No.” 

“Good, then we agree on something. You should take a break. Take your skates off, get something to eat,” Yakov says. 

“But--” 

“Take a break. That’s not a suggestion, Victor. Go,” he says putting more force behind his words. 

“Fine,” Victor says, skating toward the exit. The sounds of his blades cutting through the ice echoing around the rink. Usually, they bring him comfort, but right now they’re just a reminder of his failure. He hates them.

When he gets off the ice, he sits and unlaces his skates, unceremoniously throwing them to the ground and leaving them. He can hear Yakov calling after him, but he keeps walking, the limp he’s been battling nearly gone. He doesn’t look back and when his feet finally stop moving, he finds himself standing in the middle of the ballet studio. He stares into the mirrors that line the wall, hardly recognizing who himself in just his socks and his black sweats that are nearly soaked through with sweat and the number of times he’s hit the ice. The mirrors magnify his long messy hair, his bloodshot eyes, and the bags under them that seems to deepen the longer he looks at himself. He’s gained at least a pound or two from being off the ice and the longer he stares, the more he realizes that maybe this year won’t be his year. 

Movement near the doorway catches the corner of Victor’s eye and he thinks he sees a blast of bright orange hair, and he tenses. What does that woman want with him? Why can’t he seem to shake her? He takes a deep breath and rolls out his shoulders. He must be mistaken. He must have seen Mila with her bright red hair. He takes a deep breath to settle himself again and then heads back toward the rink.

Yakov is standing, as he always does, with his arms crossed looking over the ice as Georgi skates from a spread eagle into what he assumes is a Triple Axel. He gets two rotations, and then Georgi falls the moment his blade touches the ice again, but he pushes himself back up. Victor can’t take his eyes off of the moment. His feet finally stop moving when he’s standing next to Yakov, his arms crossed just as Yakov’s are. 

“You weren’t gone that long. Did you eat?” Yakov says, watching carefully as Georgi lands a triple Lutz and starts in on an Ina Bauer. 

“No, I--” 

“More power behind the next jump!” Yakov shouts, interrupting Victor. “I’m sorry, you were saying?” 

Victor clenches his teeth. “No, I didn’t eat. I--” 

“I didn’t think so,” Yakov turns to look at Victor. “Don’t come back to the rink until you’ve eaten something. Getting back on the ice right is going to do nothing but injure you further.” 

“But--” 

“Go!” Yakov shouts. “Before I change my mind about you being on the ice at all.” 

Victor stares at him for a moment, trying to see if Yakov is bluffing, but within moments decides that he’s not and leaves the rink entirely. 

  
  
  


It’s a short walk from the rink back to his apartment, and Makkachin cannot be any happier to see Victor when he pushes through the door. She jumps up on him immediately and he’s still wobbly on his feet, so while he doesn’t fall to the ground, he feels a strain in his ankle he’s never felt before and has to replace her to the floor quicker than he has in the past. 

“I see you were a good girl for Zoya,” he says, pulling the door shut behind him and shuffling her toward the kitchen. “She left you all kind of toys after your walk. That was so nice of her.” 

Makkachin prances after Victor, needing to be as close to his legs as possible as he opens the refrigerator door. “Yakov told me to “go get lunch” or he wouldn’t let me back on the ice,” Victor complains to the poodle. “This would never have been a problem before.” He sighs and then pulls out a tub of cold chicken noodle soup. Setting it on the counter, and popping open the lid, he doesn’t even bother to scoop any of it into a bowl, he simply pulls a spoon from the drawer next to the stove and spoons a few bites into his mouth. It’s cold and slimy, but he’s not looking to enjoy the food he’s eating, he’s looking to get back on the ice so the soup is only a means to an end.

Once he’s consumed the container, he places the empty carton in the sink and flops onto the couch, Makkachin content to come up and join him. He puts his feet on the coffee table, Makkachin’s head resting gently in his lap, and immediately he feels all of the tension from his earlier practice leave his body. 

He stretches, a yawn escaping as he did so. “Why is this happening, Makka?” He mumbles, stretching his arms overhead again before curling them all in on themselves, his head falling back against the couch, and his eyes falling shut. 

  
  
  


The place he opens his eyes to looks familiar like he’s seen it before, a wood cottage surrounded by trees embedded in a mountainside. Everything is tinted in a silver mist as he looks around. 

“Hello!” He calls out, but no one answers, his own voice echoing around the mountain and returning to him. He shrugs and walks toward the front door, grey grass under his feet squishing as he goes. 

He reaches for the cottage doorknob and it turns easily, open and inviting. So, of course, Victor wanders in.

The inside of the cottage starts to bring back some memories of being there with a storm raging outside. He shivers at the thought and turns his attention to taking in the cottage when it is calm. He notices that he is standing in a small kitchen that is immediately on the other side of the main entrance door. There are a few cabinets, a wood burning stove, and a small wooden kitchen table with two wooden chairs. He takes it all in and then moves toward the door at the back of the kitchen, which leads to the living room. 

The living room has a small black couch and a white fur rug sitting under a wood coffee table. There’s a fireplace with a fire currently crackling away and a woman with bright orange hair in a purple robe sitting with her legs tucked up underneath of her on the couch. 

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Victor says immediately upon seeing the woman. “I didn’t realize anyone was here. Wait, I know you.” 

“I don’t think you do,” the woman responds. 

“No, I’ve definitely seen you before. You’ve been...haunting me...why won’t you leave me alone?” 

“It’s nothing for you to concern yourself with,” she says, smirking. “You’re still just as pretty. I see why he likes you.” 

“I’m sorry, who likes me?” Victor’s eyes narrow and his brows furrow. 

“Why the master of course. He’s just through there, in the bedroom,” she says, gesturing further into the cottage. Victor’s gaze follows her hands and he finds himself wanting to see what’s beyond the living room. “You should go to him.” 

Victor turns his attention back to her. “Ok...” 

She smiles. “Good.”

Victor looks back toward the door and then back to the couch, but all that remains is a puff of smoke. Something in his mind is telling him that this is a trap, but his curiosity gets the better of him and he finds his feet pulling him towards the bedroom. Maybe the mysterious person in the other room can explain to him about the orange haired woman. 

He stands outside the door to the bedroom and stares, listening to the small muttering sounds coming from inside the room. He takes a deep breath and then reaches for the doorknob, speaking as he pushes it open. “Hello?”

A small squeak greets him followed by a male voice saying, “Hello? I didn’t think anyone was here.” 

Victor steps fully into the room, shutting the door behind him, to find a dark-haired boy, a boy he’s definitely seen before he’s sure of that, sitting on his knees in the center of the large bed that occupies the room. 

“The woman in the living room said you were in here,” Victor says. He wants to step forward, to sit on the bed next to the boy, but he resists. The boy looks him up and down, and Victor feels like he’s a skating routine being taken apart during a competition, he’s cataloging every detail of Victor. 

“Oh,” he responds. “She’s...she’s not supposed to...nevermind…” 

“I’m sorry,” Victor responds. “If you want me to leave, I will.” 

“No,” he says. “It’s fine.” He looks down at his hands sitting against the top of his thighs, then back up to Victor. “We’ve met before,” he says. 

Victor nods and the boy smiles. “Yes. You...you saved me from a fire.” 

“Yes,” he says. “I’m glad I get to see you again.” He smiles and Victor feels his heart leap into his throat. 

“Me too,” Victor blurts out and then follows with a toothy smile. “Can I ask a question?” 

The boy laughs. “Sure. Come sit with me.” He scooches over to the side of the bed and pats the now empty space next to him.

“Ok,” Victor says, and he crosses the room slowly. He reaches the edge of the bed and hesitates only for a moment before he slides up on it. “Who is that woman?”

“Oh,” the boy says. “That’s Vichan...she’s a friend...of sorts…”

“I see,” Victor says, nodding slowly. 

He’s careful to keep his distance, but the boy slides closer to him and leans his head against Victor’s shoulder and Victor can’t help but melt into the warm touch. It’s been such a long time since anyone has been this close to him, and he tips his head back to rest against the boy’s. 

“Thank you,” the boy whispers. 

“For what?” Victor responds. 

“For being you,” the boy replies. 

“Oh,” Victor says, letting out a soft sigh. “You’re welcome.” 

They sit together, pressed against one another, the rhythm of their breathing slowly becoming synchronized for long minutes. Victor’s never felt this in tune with anyone before and he finds himself hoping beyond reason that this is real. But, sure enough, a soft knocking at the door disturbs them. It starts quiet, but quickly travels and soon Victor feels the knocking on his thigh. He tries to stop the sensation, but he can’t no matter how hard he presses his hand against his thigh.    
  
  


 

Victor awakes panting, his phone vibrating in his pants pocket from where he left it. Once he gets his breathing under control a little more, he reaches into his pocket and pulls out the small flip phone. 

“You fell asleep, didn’t you?” Yakov says on the end, his voice gruff and monotone. 

“I--” 

“Don’t lie to me, Victor. I sent you for lunch nearly two hours ago and you haven’t returned yet.” 

He hesitates and then sighs. “Yes, I went home and had some soup, and then I fell asleep on the couch.” 

There is a long pause on the other end of the line followed by a gruff grumble. “You’re still having nightmares and you didn’t sleep again,” Yakov says. 

And now it’s Victor who pauses. He pulls the phone away from his ear despite the call of “Victor!” coming from the other end and lets it drop next to him on the couch. He runs a hand through his hair and takes a deep breath. He hasn’t told Yakov about the nightmares since he’s stopped taking the pain medication. Only his doctor knows. But, of course, he should have expected Yakov to pry. Nothing about him or his life is ever private. He takes another deep breath and then picks the phone back up. 

“No, they’ve stopped,” Victor says, his words calm and calculated.

“Victor, how do you expect me to believe that? I’m not blind. You’re still having them, which means you’re still taking the pain medication.”

“I am not!” Victor cries out, startling Makkachin who was sleeping warmly on his feet. He can feel tears starting to creep down his cheeks. Why is this happening to him? Why? “I haven’t taken it for weeks now. Not since I was cleared to start therapy. You’re just pushing me too hard.” 

“Victor,” Yakov says, gently. “I think you need to see someone about this.” 


	4. Chapter 4

The next few weeks find Victor on the ice for hours, even after Yakov has yelled at him to put his skates away and go home because he’s spent more time crashing into the ice than skating solidly on it. He had managed to land a few more jumps without getting frustrated, but he knows that this isn’t the level he was at before his injury. Still, he can’t seem to leave the ice right now, much like when he was a child and obsessed with trying to land Triple Flips or Quad Salchows, even though he only learned them the day before and wasn’t allowed to skate them in competition. 

He vaguely hears Yakov yell “Go home!” at him before his coach disappears from the rink side. The Nebelhorn Trophy is in a week and a half and for the first time in his career, he doesn’t feel ready for a competition. A few more hours on the ice can’t hurt.

As he does another lap of the rink, taking a deep breath of the cold air, he closes his eyes and the image of brown eyes and jet black hair appear instantly. There’s something about him that make Victor feel safe. Even if he is only a dream, Victor loves the time they spend together. He saw the boy again in his dreams just the night before right after another nightmare where a giant bug attached itself to his back and took him back in time to change his life. 

They had sat together along the lake that bordered the cottage, dipping their toes into the hot water in what had become their nightly ritual. Last night, Victor had laid his head on the boy’s shoulder and closed his eyes, comforted by the warmth and snuggling closer than he had before.

“It’s always so quiet here,” Victor had said, his toes wiggling just beneath the surface enough to splash the two of them. 

“That’s why I like it,” the boy had responded. “There’s no one here except you and me.” 

“I like it too,” Victor had said, nuzzling deeper into the crook of the boy's shoulder and neck. He had smiled and they sat like that for the rest of the dream until morning came and Victor had been woken up by a very harsh phone call from Yakov. 

Victor sighs and picks up pace around the rink; crossovers are easy and they always let him think. He wants to see his dream boy again and for a brief moment, he wonders if he’s falling in love with someone who isn’t real and if Yakov is right about seeing someone about the nightmares. He lets his mind take over and he does another lap. He doesn’t realize how close he’s skating to the wall, however, and by the time he realizes it, it’s too late. He hits the wall harder than intended and falls to the ground, hissing in pain as his ass makes contact with the cold surface. 

“Fuck!” He screams, but no one responds. No one reprimands him for his language. He really is alone at the rink. 

Instead of picking himself up, however, he lays back on the ice letting the cold seep into his skin. He closes his eyes, and takes a deep breath, trying to relax into the quiet and solitude that the ice provides when no one else is around. He exhales and the sound of small footsteps running across the bleachers disturbs him. His eyes shoot open and he sits up as quickly as he can, catching a glimpse of purple fabric and orange hair, or at least he thinks. He’s not sure if it’s his imagination or not, but he swears he can hear a woman’s laugh echoing around the rink. 

“Hello!” he says, tentatively. He takes a deep breath and pushes himself to stand, but no one answers and he doesn’t see anything or anyone. A shiver runs down his spine, and suddenly the ice rink doesn’t feel as comforting as it had before, so he skates to the exit of the rink and gets ready to leave. 

  
  
  


The pillow under his head later that evening is damp from his shower, he can feel its coolness as he runs his face over the fabric trying to wake himself up. He opens his eyes to pure white walls, which are a stark contrast to the soft grey of his own bedroom. He sits up, the weight of a damp sleep shirt that he’s pretty sure he wasn’t wearing when he went to sleep settling on him as he looks around at what he can only assume is a dorm room. Victor’s never gone to college properly, but he vaguely remembers what they look like from the time he dated Andrei. The more he looks around, however, the more he’s absolutely certain that this is not Andrei’s room.

He crawls out of the bed itself and makes his way over to the small desk that is cluttered with papers and a desktop computer, and takes a seat in the desk chair. Then, he begins looking through the papers as if they will give him some clue as to where he is and how he got here. As he’s sorting through them, he hits the mouse connected to the desktop computer and it wakes ups, revealing a picture of him as the backdrop. He freezes, tension coursing through his whole body and he begins to back up. This is how horror movies begin. Before he can think any further about his circumstances, however, the doorknob to the room turns and a mop of black hair and brown eyes that Victor recognizes instantly enters the room. It’s him. Oh, how he had missed him and had hoped to see him.

“What are you doing here?” the boy asks. “How did you get here?” 

Victor smiles. “I don’t know. Where am I? I woke up here.” 

The boy looks over at the bed and then back to Victor. Then, he sighs. “No, that’s not how this works. You aren’t supposed to be able to dream of me,” he says before closing his eyes tightly. 

“What? Why not?” Victor says. He starts to stand, but the floor beneath him begins to shake.

“Because those are the rules. She said that’s how this worked,” the boy replies, gripping the doorframe. 

Victor grabs for the desk and grips it as tight as he can until the floor begins to settle beneath him. He sees it morph beneath him. The carpet of the dorm room becoming the familiar wood of the cottage he knows far too well. 

He looks up from the floor and smiles at the boy who is standing across from him. “Guess I know what an earthquake feels like now,” Victor jokes. 

“Guess so,” the boy responds smiling, reaching out a hand. “Let’s go dip our feet in the lake.” 

“Ok,” Victor says, letting the boy lead him out to the lake that he’s been to so many times. 

He sits down carefully and rolls up his pajama pants before setting his feet in the warm water. He scoots closer to the boy and rests his head on the boy’s should, closing his eyes and breathing deeply. 

“I needed this,” Victor whispers. “Today was a bad day.” 

“I know what you mean,” the boy responds, reaching over and running a tentative and careful hand through Victor’s hair. “Do you want to talk about it?” His hand pauses. 

“No, I don’t,” Victor responds, encouraging the boy to continue petting his hair.

“Does it have to do with your skating?” The boy asks after long moments of calm pass and the world around them has become thick with fog.

“...Yes,” Victor says reluctant to admit it. 

The boy nods. “I’m sorry,” he says. 

Victor takes a deep breath and closes his eyes, melting into the boy’s touch. He doesn’t say anything else as the fog thickens around him. He lifts his head from the boy’s shoulder only to find that the boy has vanished and he is sitting alone in the fog. The grass beneath him has disappeared and the surrounding mountainscape and the cottage are gone as well. 

He looks around and the fog begins to turn yellow and a faint buzzing start. He moves toward it, the sound growing louder and louder as he does. He’s nervous, but he can’t control his feet anymore and they are just marching straight toward the sound, whatever it may be. 

The vibration of his phone on the nightstand startles him awake. He pants as he arches off the bed searching for air as if he were drowning. His phone stops vibrating on the table and once he’s caught his breath, he reaches for it in the dark, finally finding it after several long moments. It’s a text message from Yakov. Victor doesn’t open it. 

Instead, he turns his phone off and stares at the ceiling, letting the feeling of resting his head on the boy in his dream’s shoulder wash over him as it had in his dream. He breathes deep and the more comfortable he gets, the more he finds himself wishes the boy were real and with him right now. 

A slightly uncomfortable feeling makes itself known to Victor almost immediately and he finds himself reaching for his half hard cock, stroking himself gently until he’s fully aroused and wanting. That night he comes to the vision of a boy with dark hair and glasses smiling as he dips his toes in a lake, and Victor can’t wipe the smile off his face. And afterward, when he’s all cleaned up, he doesn’t go back to sleep. 

  
  
  


The Nebelhorn Trophy is in September, almost fourteen weeks after Victor had the case removed from his foot. Not that anyone is counting. The moment that he sets foot in the arena, he can feel the eyes of everyone staring at him. He follows Yakov, keeping his head down, trying to focus as best he can, but nothing is right. He still hasn’t had some restful sleep and the bags under his eyes don’t lie about that. 

“Just relax,” Yakov says to Victor as he finishes lacing his skates for the warm-up session before the start of the competition. His voice is gentler than normal. “Concentrate and you’ll do just fine.” 

Victor looks over his shoulder at him and furrows his brow. “Are you feeling alright?” he asks. 

“Yes. Why?” Yakov responds, the gruffness returning immediately. 

“No reason,” Victor responds, leaving the locker room and taking his first steps onto the ice. 

He glides out onto the ice and takes a deep breath, allowing the cold to make its way into his lungs. He breathes deeper as he picks up pace doing forward strokes around the outside of the rink to warm up and after a few minutes he thinks it’s probably best to start running through bits of his program, which he does, marking the jumps for fear that if he lands them incorrectly during the practice, he won’t land them at all during the actual performance. 

And as he stands center ice for his first performance at the Nebelhorn Trophy, his first competition since his fall, he’s unsure if he made the right decision this morning. The crowd cheers louder than he’s ever heard the moment that he takes the ice; he assumes it’s because he’s been injured. He waves to the fans and then comes to take his place center ice, hands gracefully held behind his back. 

He takes a deep breath, eyes settling toward the ice and then the music fills the arena and Victor lunges forward, only his toe pick holding him back and pulls himself back in. He pushes off, gliding around through some beautiful and deep edges and circles around picking up some speed before a three turn and taking off for the first jump of the program, a Triple Lutz.

He can hear the audience gasp as he lands the jump on a shaky ankle. But he lands it, and that is what matters. He didn’t fall. He takes a deep breath and pushes on, picking up speed around the curves of the rink heading full speed into his Triple Axel as the music crescendos. He takes a deep breath and pushes off through the toe pick, rotating once, then twice before he hits the ice. It takes him several minutes to right himself, but he does though he never quite skates in time to the music for the rest of the performance. 

The moment he leaves the ice for the kiss and cry, he knows his score will not be great. He doesn’t expect it to be as awful as it is, however. 54.19. That’s the score the announcer reads over the loudspeaker and it’s the number on the screen in front of him. It’s the lowest score he’s ever received in his entire skating career. He takes a deep breath and looks over to Yakov, who sits beside him, arms crossed over his chest, his expression unchanging. He waits for some piece of comfort, some lecture, but they never come. Instead, they leave the kiss and cry in silence as the next skater takes center ice for their program. 

“You’re at least twenty points behind,” Yakov says as Victor gathers his things from the locker room. “You’ll need to skate a near perfect program tomorrow to catch up.” 

Victor doesn’t say anything, he only nods his head. But, Victor’s free skate goes just as poorly as his short program. He takes the ice and immediately he can tell something is wrong. He’s nervous. He’s never nervous, but right now he is.

When the music starts he glides forward and pulls himself back into his starting position and then begins his backward crossovers. He does a quick turn, picking up more speed and then does an inside three turn, prepping for the first jump of his program, a Triple Loop. He waits for the music and then begins his entry, but the moment he leaves the ice, he knows he won’t land the jump. He falls to the ice, sliding a bit, but quickly picks himself up and keeps skating. 

He doesn’t land any of his jumps throughout the entire program and while his step sequence was one of the best ones he’s ever performed, he knows it’s not enough to place. 93.91 is the score being read over the loudspeaker as he sits next to Yakov again in the kiss and cry. He’s currently in first place, but there are still several skaters after him.  

When the day finally comes to an end, Victor is in 12th place. He hasn’t scored so poorly since he was a boy just learning how to take the ice and even then, he never placed this far down. Tears silently stream down Victor’s stoic face as he watches the awards ceremony from the sidelines, clapping for Georgi, who has finally placed. He knows he should be happy for his teammate, but he just can’t bring himself to smile, so after they place the medals around each of the winners’ necks, he makes his way to the locker room where he just about collapses in tears in front of his locker. 

“Your jumps were sloppy,” Yakov says from behind him. “I’m not sure what you expected, but I hope that this failure will make you work harder. And maybe now you’ll take my advice and see someone about this problem.” 

Victor doesn’t say anything, instead, he lets the tears flow down his face, and then he reaches into his locker for his bag. He throws it over his shoulder and makes his way toward the exit, leaving Yakov behind. 


	5. Chapter 5

“Yakov says your training is going better, would you agree?” Dr. Voronova says. She’s staring at Victor and he doesn’t like the feeling that someone other than a skating judge is taking him apart piece by piece. 

“It’s going fine, yes,” he responds, sighing. 

“What’s wrong?” She asks, scribbling something quickly on her yellow legal pad and then returning her attention to Victor.

“Nothing,” Victor replies. He leans back against the plush red chair that he’s sitting on, and looks around the office. He’s been here a dozen times at least. The walls are still painted the flat eggshell white color and there are still inspirational posters hanging about, and Victor still doesn’t want to be here. 

“Something must be wrong,” Dr. Voronova says pulling Victor from his headspace. 

“Nothing is wrong,” Victor says more forceful this time, he regrets it almost as immediately as the words come out of his mouth. 

“Alright,” she responds, nodding. 

“I’m sorry,” Victor says after a few moments of silence. He watches as she scribbles more things across the legal pad. 

“It’s alright,” she says. “I think our time is up for today. So I will see you in two weeks after your competition. Please try the sleep exercises we talked about earlier in the session. Does that sound ok to you?” 

“Yes,” he replies. He pushes himself up out of the chair, grabs his bag from the floor, and heads toward the door. “See you then.” And then he disappears into the hallway. 

His phone rings almost immediately and he looks down at it, Yakov’s name flashing across the screen. He flips it open and brings it to his ear. 

“Hello?” He says as if he isn’t annoyed that Yakov’s calling. 

“You’re on your way to practice?”

“Yes,” Victor responds as he gets into his car. “I’ll be there soon.” 

“Good. We have a lot of work to do before NHK. Especially after that performance at Nebelhorn,” Yakov says and then the phone goes dead. 

Victor pulls it away from his ear and stares at it before throwing in the seat next to him. He sighs and throws his head against the steering wheel, tears threatening to form at the corner of his eyes. What is happening to him? Why can’t things be the way they were? 

After a few soft sobs, he pushes himself up from his slumped position and starts the car, leaving the parking lot and heading towards the rink, only his thoughts accompanying him on the drive. 

  
  
  


His blades cut through the ice as he comes to rest in the final pose of his short program. He drops the pose and skates over to the wall. He’s breathing heavy from all of the exertions and reaches for his water bottle, which Yakov offers. The run through had been a struggle and he can’t seem to shake the feeling that no matter how hard he tries, he will never be the skater that he once was. It’s two weeks before the start of the Grand Prix and he’s beginning to wonder if this is his last season. He recaps the water bottle and places it on the rink wall. 

“What’s next?” Victor asks between short breaths. 

“You go home,” Yakov replies. 

“What? But--” 

“Do not argue with me, Victor. You will take your skates off and go home,” Yakov says shooting Victor a glare that Victor hasn’t seen since he was a child and refused to get off of the ice to let the seniors practice. He remembers the consequences too. 

“Fine,” Victor concedes, and he skates off the ice toward the exit where Yakov hands him his blade guards immediately. 

He doesn’t shower or change his clothes, he simply takes off his skates and changes into a pair of sneakers before heading home. The world around him is spinning and he swears he sees someone orange hair waiting near his car when he leaves the rink, but as he gets closer, no ones there. He drives home in silence, slower than usual, weary of things his eyes are seeing.

Once he’s back inside his apartment, he slumps back against the door taking deep breaths. Makkachin stirs on the couch but doesn’t move. Victor can’t tell if he’s relieved that Makka didn’t come bounding over to greet him or disappointed that Makka didn’t care. He takes another deep breath letting the tension from the day wash away from him. It’s been so frustrating and now that he’s finally made a breakthrough he can feel his emotions taking over him. The tears rushing to his eyes no matter how quickly he tries to fight it. 

“This wasn’t exactly what I had in mind for him,” a female voice says and it startles Victor. 

His breath stutters as he tries to wipe his eyes as quickly as he can. He presses himself back as far as he possibly can against the door and slides his way back up the door, his eyes coming to meet the amber eyes of a woman with orange hair. She’s sitting on the back of the couch, wearing what looks like a green and gold kimono, running her fingers through her long hair. 

“What?” Victor whispers. “No. No.” 

“No, what?” She says, her voice thick in his ears like syrup. 

He takes another deep breath. “You aren’t real. You’re just…” 

“Just what? Imaginary?” She smirks. 

“You’re just a dream! Everything is just a dream! None of this is real?” 

“Are you so sure of that?” She scoffs, sliding down to the floor from the back of the couch. 

“Yes! You’re nothing but side effects. You have to be,” Victor says feeling his voice straining to convince himself of what he’s saying. 

“Side effects of what? You stopped taking those medications, remember?” she says, walking toward him. “I am very much real. I’m sorry. This would be so much easier if he would just accept my gift.” She stops only a few inches from his face, her eyes boring into him as she raises her fingers and snaps. 

“What does that mean?!” Victor screams as everything around plunges into darkness. 

He can’t see his hand in front of his own face. He takes a step forward and realizes all too quickly that he is unable to move. He takes a deep breath, trying to slow his ever-increasing anxiety. His ankle, the one he broke, of course, feels heavy and as Victor bends over to examine what could be the cause, he discovers a metal shackle on his ankle attached to a long chain that he assumes is attached to a wall. 

“Hello?” Victor calls out tentatively. He’s seen enough horror movies in his life to know this is exactly how one of them would start. No, no, no, this is just a bad dream, he keeps telling himself as he sinks to the ground and pulls his legs to his chest. He takes another deep breath and tries to keep himself calm. He won’t get anywhere if he’s upset and panicking, he knows. 

“Hello?” He tries again. 

A laugh greets him in response and Victor tenses at the sound. “Tick, tock,” the woman’s voice says again. He’s sure he recognizes it, but he just can’t place it. 

“What does that mean? Why are you doing this?” He yells in response, but only gets laughter as a reply. 

He closes his eyes and reaches down toward his ankle, feeling the cool metal against his hand, he gives the chain one tug before resigning himself to being stuck. However, it doesn’t take long before he hears footsteps coming toward him. He scrambles to his feet, following the chain and finding the cold stone wall he’s attached to. 

The footsteps get louder as they approach and then a voice, one that he recognizes almost immediately, the boy from the cottage. “This isn’t fair!” The boy yells. “You can’t just play with people’s lives like this. Do you hear me? It told you I didn’t want him like this!” 

The footsteps stop and then a bright blue light fills the room and Victor can see the boy approaching him, mouth set in determination. He reaches Victor and bend down, pulling a key from his pocket. “I’m so sorry,” he says as he unlocks the shackle. 

Victor moves his ankle and pushes himself to his feet. “Thank you,” he says to the boy. But before he can say anything else, the boy has vanished and he’s alone. 

Suddenly, the floor beneath him starts to shake and Victor braces himself, pressing himself as flat as he can against the stone wall he was once chained to. He closes his eyes and as he hears things begin to hit the ground the ground beneath his feet gives way and he begins to plummet.

  
  
  


His bed is soft and warm, but it brings no comfort to Victor when he wakes up panting. He’s silently sobbing and he starts to rub his face into the duvet to rid himself of the tears and snot. Then, he looks around his familiar bedroom and nothing looks out of the ordinary. He reaches for his cell phone and it’s exactly where he usually puts it. He doesn’t remember going to bed last night, but that doesn’t mean he didn’t. 

He unlocks the phone and find no new messages in either the sent or received boxes and sighs a little at the relief that at least he didn’t make a fool of himself to anyone of importance. He then scrolls through his contact list, landing on Chris and calling immediately. 

“Hello?” Chris says, his voice heavy and cracking with the remnants of sleep. 

“Chris,” Victor breathes into the phone, holding back more tears than he wants to be. 

“Victor? It’s three in the morning. I have to be to the rink in three hours, what do you want?” Chris groans. 

Victor can hear the irritation in his voice, but he ignores it and pushes on. “I...I think I’m losing my mind,” Victor whispers. 

“What?” Chris deadpans. 

“I said, I think I’m losing my mind, Chris,” Victor says, irritation and force breaking through. 

“Why would you say that?” Chris asks. 

“You remember the dreams I was having?” Victor asks. 

“Yes,” Chris responds. 

“Well, they...they aren’t dreams anymore...they...they haven’t been just dreams for a while...and...well...” Victor spits out.

“Do you want to know what I think?” 

“You’re going to tell me anyway I’m sure, so go ahead,” Victor sighs. 

“I think you’re stressed about competing in the Grand Prix. Especially because Nebelhorn didn’t go as planned. I think you need to relax. Go back to sleep and stop thinking about whether you’re going to place.” 

“Chris...I…” 

“What is it?” 

“Nothing,” Victor says, pressing his lips together. “It’s nothing.” 

“Ok. Try to get some sleep,” Chris says and then the line goes dead before Victor even has a chance to say goodbye.

He drops his phone back on his nightstand and then takes a deep breath. Maybe Chris is right. Maybe it is all the stress that’s been getting to him. So he closes his eyes, takes a deep breath, and drifts off into a light sleep, only to be awoken two hours later by his alarm that indicates another day of practice. 


	6. Chapter 6

In the week leading up to NHK, Victor still can’t seem to stay upright on the ice. The day before he’s supposed to board a plane to Nagoya, he puts in extra hours at the rink. He’s alone for the most part, just him and the ice. Or so he thinks as he picks up pace around the rink preparing for a jump, a Quad Salchow. He takes off and for the first time in a long time, he thinks he’s going to land, but sure enough, as with every other jump that he’s tried, he falls and goes rolling across the ice. He curses, slamming his hand into the ice and then, out of nowhere, Yakov calls him over rinkside, a look of sadness and anger on his face. But, Victor doesn’t come. Instead, he starts on another lap around the rink. 

“You should call it a day for today,” Yakov calls across the ice. “That’s the fiftieth fall you’ve had. You’ve got bruises on bruises and at the rate you’re going, you’re likely to break your ankle again or start a completely new injury.” 

“But, my jumps…” 

“Will be what they are,” Yakov says. “The bags under your eyes haven’t gone away in weeks. I think the best thing for you right now is to go home and sleep. We have a big day tomorrow!” 

“I can’t…” Victor says, starting into position on an Axel, but deciding against attempting the jump at the last second. 

“Look, I don’t care what you do once you leave this rink, but you will not get back on this ice. Do you understand?” 

“And if I do?” Victor asks finally coming over to the rinkside where Yakov is standing, his heavy coat draped over his arm. 

“I’ll withdraw you from the competition and the rest of the season. If you don’t want to listen to your coach, then you don’t get to compete,” Yakov yells, handing Victor his blade guards. 

Victor nods and steps off the ice. When he arrives home later that night, he dropped his things by the door and immediately calls Chris, who lets his call go to voicemail. He groans and tosses his phone across the room before checking to make sure everything is packed in his bags for the morning flight. Once he’s satisfied with his packing, he showers and then tries to sleep, but his mind won’t let him.    
  
  


 

Victor is exhausted as he leans against the back wall of the rink entrance, but there’s something in the air that he can’t quite put his finger on that’s keeping him awake, an electric spark that shoots through him. The first group of skaters is finishing their time on the ice for the warm-up and that’s when Victor see him. He watches as a Japanese skater stays on the ice as the others are leaving and he’s frozen watching him. It’s him, he’s almost sure of it. The boy who keeps haunting his dreams. This can’t be happening to him. This is another dream of his. It must be. 

He stands perfectly still, waiting for his phone, or a knock at the door or Yakov’s voice to bring him back to reality, but nothing does. “Taking the ice now, representing Japan, Yuuri Katsuki,” the announcer call and the boy skates out to the center of the ice.  No, this is actually happening and Victor feels his heart aching as he anticipates the boy’s first move. There’s a brief silence that washes over the arena as the boy takes his starting pose and then the music of a piano begins to ring out and the boy on the ice begins to move.

The man lunges forward and then retreats back to his original position, extending his arms as if he were a bird before whipping them over his head and moving into backward crossovers. Victor can’t take his eyes off of him, hypnotized by the man’s seemingly effortless movements. He watches as the man leads up to his first jump, what is supposed to be a Triple Salchow, but he misses the landing, falling across the ice. Victor’s breath catches in his throat until he sees the man push himself off the ice. 

He can feel his heart beating in every part of his body. This can’t be good for his concentration, so he forces himself to pull away from watching the man’s performance and walks back toward the locker room. 

“Is everything ok?” Georgi, who had skated earlier in the competition, asks when he finds Victor sitting on the bench in his locker room aisle. He’s back in his warm-up sweats, his grossly over dramatic makeup covering his face as he awaits his turn to skate in the group.

“Yes. Yes,” Victor hesitates on the first confirmation but steadies on the second. Georgi stares at him for a moment, but doesn’t say anything, and Victor all but ignores him. He  _ needs _ to focus on his short program if he’s going to qualify for the Grand Prix Finals. He puts his headphones in and ignores Georgi to continue stretching. 

Another deep breath has his mind clearing and refocusing on his skating. He imagines himself spinning in the center of the ice, taking off for a Quad Flip and landing it perfectly. He’s not sure how long he’s been stretching and visualizing, but Yakov soon appears and Victor removes his headphones for a brief moment letting himself hear the applause from the crowd fills the stadium and his nerves tense. He takes another deep breath and pushes himself up from the locker room bench and makes his way to the entrance to the rink for the warm-up of Group Two. 

Yakov with his standard, unemotional expression is waiting for him along with Lilia. He takes off his blade guards and hands them over. 

“Just remember to focus,” Yakov says as Victor steps out onto the ice to loud cheers from his fans. 

He positions himself in his starting pose, his hands wrapped tightly around himself, and then the first chords of the music trickle out of the arena’s speakers. He pulls his arms up around his body and over his head and brings them down open palmed in front of him, his eyes looking toward the ceiling of the stadium. Then, he pushes off with a few strong forward strokes and extends his left leg up into a spiral.

He’s on the ice for two minutes and thirty seconds. Enough for the ice to take hold of him and for him to lose himself to the ice as he always has. He hasn’t skated like this since he fell. But, here the ice is finally speaking to him again and letting him reach his true potential. 

He finishes the skate coming out of a flying sit spin and brings his arms up toward the ceiling, his face staring down at the ice. He’s deaf for a moment, he can see the audience cheering around him, but he can’t hear anything. And then, it all rushes back to him. He smiles and takes a bow to each side of the stadium before skating off the ice, grabbing a small stuffed poodle, one that reminds him of his Makkachin, on his way to the Kiss and Cry where Yakov and Lilia are waiting. 

“You didn’t land that Triple Toe Loop cleanly,” Yakov mutters, his arms crossed over his chest and his trademark scowl on his face. “And your exit from your last spiral was clumsy.” 

Victor doesn’t respond and instead stares out at the audiences, many of whom are still on their feet, waiting with him for the scores. It’s only the short program, but every point counts. And then the announcer speaks. “The score for Victor Nikiforov is 80.92. He is currently in first place.” 

He breathes a sigh of relief and smiles, waving to his fans who have burst into cheers. It’s not his best performance, but he certainly has a sizeable lead over his fellow skaters. He turns to Yakov, who still has a scowl etched across his face and shrugs. Then, he exits the Kiss and Cry and heads directly toward the locker room. 

He’s the only one left in the locker room, or so he assumes, so he takes his time undressing, sitting down on the bench in the middle of the aisle and unlacing his skates. He stretches his feet once he’s no longer wearing his skates, and then he starts to change back into his sweats. 

Once Victor has changed his clothes he relaxes on the bench and sighs. It has been a long day and he finds himself slightly disappointed with his performance. Suddenly his ears pick up movement behind him. 

“Victor,” Yakov calls into the locker room. “Hurry up, we’re leaving.” 

He runs a hand over his face and pushes himself up off of the bench, grabbing his bag in the process and then he heads toward the door. He doesn’t expect to stop dead in his tracks in the eleven feet between his row in the locker room and the door, but he is. 

Victor stares at the man in front of him. A man struggling to shove everything inside of his bag as he walks straight toward Victor, clearly not paying attention. Once he finishes shoving everything into his bag, the man looks ups. Caramel brown eyes behind blue-rimmed glasses, jet black hair swept messily across his face, and a smile that Victor would recognize anywhere that fades instantly the moment he sees Victor. It’s the man he has seen in his dreams over and over again. He’s sure of it.  

Victor stares at him, lips pressed together, unsure of what to say, but it only takes mere moments for the man to decide his course of action. He changes his course of path almost immediately, and darts down the nearest locker aisle. Victor’s unsure of what has just happened, but by the time his brain catches up with him and he starts to chase after him, dropping his bag in the main hallway, and darting down an aisle. The locker room isn’t very large, so Victor is sure he will find him. But, after looking around, sure that this was the aisle the man darted down, there’s no trace. 

“Victor!” Yakov’s voice rings out over the locker room. “Victor! Let’s go!” 

He looks around at the once again empty locker room, feeling his heart racing in his chest. The man is real. How can that be? How many of the dreams are real if this one is? That can’t be. 

“Victor!” Another shout from Yakov breaks his concentration and he returns the main hallway. 

“I’m coming!” Victor shouts back. He hoists his bag from the floor and walks toward the exit, leaving the locker room entirely empty.

  
  
  


“His name is Yuuri Katsuki and he’s a figure skater,” Victor nearly shouts across the room. He’s laying on his bed back at the hotel room, running his hands over his face. Chris is sitting across from him in the large leather desk chair, his legs crossed elegantly one over the other.

“He’s from Japan, in case that wasn’t obvious,” Chris says, smirking as he watches Victor squirm on the bed. “Why are you so interested in him?” 

“No reason,” Victor says slowly, but he knows Chris will call him out on the hesitation any moment. 

“Nice try,” Chris says, fulfilling Victor’s assessment of the situation. “I know that tone if I’ve ever heard it. Tell me.” 

“No,” Victor says, sitting up and looking Chris up and down. 

“I’m just going to find out anyway,” Chris responds tapping, running his finger along his jawline. “And you wouldn’t have invited me here if you didn’t want to tell me. You could have figured this all out for yourself.” 

Victor groans. “Fine. You remember the dreams I was having, right?” 

“The really weird nightmares? Like the one where I was a vampire? Yeah, I remember those,” Chris says. He leans forward, and Victor is regretting his decision to invite Chris to his hotel room every moment that this conversation continues.

“...Yes, those.” 

“I’m following. Go on,” he says, winking. 

Victor sighs. “Fine, fine. Well, they haven’t all been nightmares. One of them that happens a lot is actually really nice and I always meet a boy in it...and he looks a lot like Yuuri Katsuki. I think it’s him.” 

“So, you think you’ve been dreaming about Yuuri Katsuki? An average senior division Japanese figure skater that you’ve never met before?” Chris asks, smirking. 

“When you put it that way, it sounds ridiculous.” Victor flops back down onto the bed.             

“That’s because it is ridiculous. You can’t dream about someone you’ve never seen!” Chris says coming over to lay down next to Victor on the bed.

“But, I am Chris! I am!” Victor slams his fists next to him on the bed.

“Victor, you didn’t know who he was prior to today. You didn’t know his name. And now you’re suddenly obsessed with the kid! Tell me what this is really about,” Chris says reaching out and patting Victor’s leg. 

Victor groans. “Chris, I think I’m losing my mind.” He pushes himself up until he’s sitting. He moves closer to Chris as leans his head against Chris’ shoulder, tears making his eyes glassy, threatening to stream down his face at any moment. He can feel Chris tense underneath of him, confused and slightly unnerved at the nerve of Victor’s that he’s struck. He pats Victor on the shoulder and Victor cuddles in closer. 

“You aren’t...you...you’re just stressing yourself out,” Chris says. “You just need to relax.” 

Victor takes a deep breath and he feels the tears start down his face. “I just…” 

“Why don’t you take the rest of the night and go to bed early,  Mon Chéri ? We don’t have to go out and get dinner. We can do that some other time. That way you’ll be ready for the Free Skate tomorrow. I want to compete against you when you’re skating your best,” Chris says running his hands through Victor’s long silver hair, twirling it between his fingers. 

He sniffles and nods against Chris’ shoulder. “Ok,” he says. “Ok. You should go then. I can take care of myself.” 

“Are you sure? I can stay if you want me to. It’s no problem,” Chris says. 

“I’m sure,” Victor responds, sitting up and pulling from Chris’ embrace. He wipes his eyes on his sleeve and sniffles before giving Chris a smile. “I’m sure.” 

Chris nods. “Ok. I’ll see you in the morning. If you need anything, you should call me.” 

“I will,” Victor responds. “I will.” 

“Ok.” Chris pats the spot next to Victor one last time and then he pushes himself up from the bed, grabs his coat from the back of the leather chair, and leaves. 

  
  
  


Silence makes its way into Victor’s hotel room for the first time since he got back to the room after the competition, and it makes him shiver. He sits on the bed for a brief moment before he makes his ways to the bathroom and starts filling the bathtub with water. His course of action is simple in his mind, he’ll take a bath, he’ll order room service, and then he’ll put on the television and watch bad programs until he falls asleep. 

But his plans don’t work out as he thought. As fate would have it, there’s a knock on his door just as he finishes turning off the water for his bath. Thinking that it must be Chris, who has decided that Victor can’t spend the night alone, Victor grabs the robe from behind the bathroom door and makes his way over to the door. He opens it without looking through the peephole and then stares open-mouthed at the boy standing before him. 

The man’s eyes widen the moment he sees Victor standing in front of him and he takes a sharp inhale of breath. “You’re not Phichit,” the boy, who Victor instantly recognizes as Yuuri Katsuki, says. He even sounds like the boy from his dreams and Victor can’t help but feel his heart do a Flip in his chest. “He must have sent the wrong room number. I’m sorry.” He turns to leave, but Victor stops him. 

“It’s not a problem,” Victor says, staring at Yuuri. This must be a dream. It must be. He looks up and down the hallway and over his shoulder, but everything looks normal. He feels normal. “I’m Victor Nikiforov.” 

“I...I know…” Yuuri replies. “I’ve admired your skating for a long time. Your programs are brilliant. I’m sorry about your broken ankle at the end of last season. I’m glad you’re better.” 

“Thank you,” Victor replies. “You’re...you’re Yuuri Katsuki.” 

Yuuri’s eyes widen to the size of saucers behind his glasses and his mouth starts to gape open. “Y-y-yes,” he stutters. “That’s me.” He looks like he wants to run again. 

“I thought so,” Victor says, smiling. 

“Umm...how do you know me?” Yuuri says. He’s not looking at Victor and he keeps fidgeting, and Victor knows that he can’t keep the boy chatting with him the way he wants to.

“Oh, I...I saw you skate today. It was an amazing program. I’m excited for your Free Skate tomorrow,” Victor lies. 

“Really?” Yuuri says, looking up and for the first time meeting Victor’s eyes. But he quickly reverts his face to the floor the moment he notices Victor looking back at him. 

“Yes,” Victor says. He pauses and stares at Yuuri, taking in everything he possibly can while the boy of his dreams, quite literally, is standing in front of him. Then he continues. “I’m sorry. You just look very familiar to me. You should probably go. Your friend must be waiting for you. I don’t want to take up all of your time.” 

“Right. Yes,” Yuuri says as if he’d forgotten why he had knocked on Victor’s door in the first place. 

Victor smiles and steps back from the doorway, hoping the indication that he’s going to shut his door will spur Yuuri to move. And it does. He watches through the peephole in his room as Yuuri shuffles down the hallway and knocks on a door only four doors down from his own. He sighs when Yuuri disappears from the hallway and into the other hotel room. He turns and slides down to the floor breathing a sigh of relief and excitement. 

It takes him a few moments, but he gathers himself up from the floor, forgetting entirely about the bath he was planning to take and instead makes his way to the bed. The large queen sized bed with sheets that feel smooth and cool against his now hot and bothered skin. He sheds his robe immediately upon climbing into the bed. That night he comes to the images of dark brown eyes hidden under messy black hair and when he sleeps, no dream or nightmare, for once, haunts him. 

  
  
  


The rink the next morning feels more electric than it did the day before. There’s a fire burning through Victor’s veins that he hasn’t felt since his very first competition at the young age of ten. He doesn’t know where the energy came from or why it’s appeared, but finally, he feels like his old self again. 

He finishes getting dressed in the locker room and then makes his way to the rink for the morning practice session where he takes his first step onto the ice feeling like himself again. He relaxes almost immediately and even Yakov, who has been trying his very best to pay more attention to Georgi, can’t help but see that something changes when Victor takes his first glide that time.

Yakov watches as Victor does a few laps, cautiously, trying not to be overly optimistic, but once he’s satisfied, he calls Victor over to the rink wall. 

“You seem to be feeling better,” Yakov says. 

“Yes,” Victor says. “I don’t know what happened.” 

“It doesn’t matter,” Yakov says. “You can potentially make the podium if you keep yourself focused.” 

Victor smirks at Yakov, a determination in his eyes. “I plan to,” he says. Then he pushes off the wall and skates away. 

He takes another lap of the rink without paying too much attention to anyone on the ice, but then he catches a glimpse of bright orange hair too close to the rink wall and loses his balance. He hits like a child, legs sprawled out beneath, and making a loud ‘thump’ when his ass makes contact with the ice. 

“Fuck,” he sighs and mutters to himself. Yakov is watching him across the rink, but not making an effort to rush onto the ice. He must think Victor is fine then, and he would be right. Victor makes a quick assessment of himself, and then quickly rights himself on the ice. 

Not many of the skaters notice, but one does. Yuuri Katsuki. He’s skating over to Victor as quickly as he can and stops with an inelegant hockey stop, spraying Victor with ice. 

“I’m so sorry!” He says, covering his face which has an intense blush creeping over it. “Are...are you alright?” 

Victor smiles. “Yes, thank you for asking. I just thought I saw someone and I lost my balance.” 

“Oh,” Yuuri said. 

“It’s nothing, really. Don’t worry about it. You should finish your practice,” Victor says looking around the rink for the person before looking back at Yuuri.

Yuuri smiles. “Ok,” he says, and then he skates a lap around the rink before returning to his practicing his spins. 

Victor watches him, mesmerized as he first was the moment Yuuri took the ice yesterday. 

“Get back to practice!” Yakov yells across the ice and Victor looks back at him and nods and pushes off the wall to resume his practice. 

When the timer goes off indicating that the morning practice is over, Victor looks for Yuuri as he leaves the ice, but he can’t find him. He looks around the stadium, but Yuuri is nowhere to be found. The woman with the orange hair, however, is standing in the stands wrapped in a leopard print blanket. They make eye contact, but it is broken the moment that Yakov snaps his fingers in front of Victor’s face. When he turns back to look for her again, she’s gone. 

“Who are you looking for?” Yakov asks. “You’ve been distracted all morning.” 

“No one,” Victor replies. 

“Good, now let’s get ready for the competition,” Yakov says, grabbing hold of Victor’s arms and escorting him to the locker room. 

  
  
  


The moments before Victor takes the ice are the most stressful. Instead of staying in the locker room and stretching out like Yakov has told him to, he decides he wants, no, needs to see Yuuri skate. He finds himself standing on the sideline with the other skaters in Group One, trying his best to blend in. He’s looking around for Yuuri but doesn’t see him with the other skaters.

The first skater, a young man from China that Victor hasn’t bother learning the name of, takes the ice, waving to the fans in the audience. He takes his opening pose and then the music begins and Victor finds his mind wandering, daydreams of Yuuri flooding his mind. When he finally looks back up to the ice, Yuuri is skating toward the center of the ice, hands waving in the air to the crowd. Victor smiles and cheers, which brings the attention of the other skaters toward him, so he quickly quiets down, he is trying to keep a low profile after all. 

Yuuri’s standing center with one foot behind him and his knees crossed and then the music begins. He lunges forward and he pulls himself back before heading in the other direction extending his leg behind him and even though it’s only been thirty seconds, Victor can’t take his eyes off of Yuuri. Yuuri makes a quick hop off the ice before he starts his crossovers into a three turn for his first jump, a Triple Lutz. Victor can feel his heart in his chest, beating as fast as it does when he’s on the ice himself. And Yuuri takes off, but his landing fails and Victor can feel his heart stop momentarily as Yuuri crashes to the ice. 

“Come on. Get up,” Victor mutters to himself, clenches his fists while he waits what feels like an eternity for Yuuri to pick himself back up. But he does and he keeps skating and Victor starts to breathe again. 

“You shouldn’t be watching,” Yakov says behind him, placing a hand on his shoulder and pulling Victor’s attention from the rink. “You should be stretching out and getting ready. You’re next.” 

Victor sighs, turning to stare at Yakov, a challenge in his eyes. “Fine.” 

Yakov leads him back to the locker room where Georgi and Chris are stretching out. The music from Yuuri’s program is faint in the background, but Victor has given up trying to look over his shoulder to see the man skate or straining his ears to hear the music and the telltale sign of skates gliding across the ice. Chris smiles at him once Yakov has left, while Georgi looks at him with an expression of both sympathy and judgment. 

“You were watching Katsuki, weren’t you?” Chris teases.

“So what if I was?” Victor replies making taking a seat on the floor and beginning to stretch out. 

Chris shrugs. “I never said it was a bad thing.” 

Victor laughs. “Fair enough.” 

  
  
  


Group Two consists of five skaters, Chris, Georgi, a skater from France Victor can’t seem to remember the name of, an American that Victor has definitely had a few conversations with, a newcomer from Korea, and himself. They all take the ice one by one for the six-minute warm-up and then it’s back to the sidelines while the first skater, the French skater, takes the ice. 

Victor has finally focused and he’s doesn’t hear any of the commotions around him when Chris lands his first Quad or when the American breaks the Free Skate record. When the announcer calls his name, he freezes for a moment, before Yakov yells at him to take the ice. He’s the last skater of the day, so he knows what he has to beat to make it to the finals. He skates out waving to his fans as every other skater has, but he’s also scanning the audience, trying to take in every face he can see. And that’s when he sees her; sitting in the stands is the orange haired woman.

He turns around to take his position in the center of the rink and takes one more look into the stands, but the orange haired woman has disappeared. He closes his eyes and takes a deep breath and then the music begins. Victor looks up toward the ceiling and then he brings his hands up over his head and pushes around in a circle before extending into a lunge. He pulls up from the lunge and turns gliding across the ice on his left foot, adding in a few backward crossovers to pick up some speed before he hits his first jump of the program, a Quad Salchow. He can hear the audience waiting with baited breath as he soars through the air and lands. He hasn’t landed that jump cleanly in a month and doing makes him feel like he has finally returned to take his place on the ice. 

The audience bursts into applause and Victor can’t help but use their energy as motivation. He turns and jumps in a flying sit spin, bringing it up and finishing it with a layback before moving on to the step sequence. 

By the time Victor finishes his program, he’s landed all three of his other jumps cleanly and the audience is on their feet, a sight that Victor has only ever seen once before, the time he won the Junior Grand Prix. He sits next to Yakov in the Kiss and Cry, Yakov trying to lecture him on how he misstepped during the second step sequence, but Victor’s not interested. He waves to the audience again and looks over at his fellow skaters. And then his score comes back. 

“The score for Victor Nikiforov representing Russia is 149.81, bringing his total score to 225.70. He is in first place,” the announcer says, and Victor stares at the digital display of his score in front of him. He’s done it. He’s won gold.   
  
  


 

He’s not expecting company. Especially not since Chris found an extremely attractive French accountant, who was on vacation, while they were out at dinner after the medal ceremony. It’s eleven o’clock and Victor had planned to relax by himself in his hotel room, but the knocking on his door interrupts him. It stops for a brief moment but then resumes, quieter this time. He pushes himself up from his chair and makes his way to the door, only to find Yuuri Katsuki on the other side again.

Yuuri’s gorgeous and everything that Victor wants. He can feel the blood starting to rush toward his cock with the way that movement flows through Yuuri’s body as he stands outside of Victor’s hotel room door fidgeting, but Victor can’t stop watching. 

“Hello again,” Victor says. His brows furrow as he tries to figure out why Yuuri Katsuki is standing in front of him. The only logical conclusions he can think of, didn’t he have a friend staying down the hallways? That must be it. “I think you may have the wrong room again.” 

“Oh, hello,” Yuuri responds. “No, I...I have the right room. I was looking for you.” 

“You were?” Victor asks a smile growing on his face.

“Y-yes. I was,” Yuuri responds. 

“Come in, then. I was just relaxing for the evening,” Victor says, moving out of the way of the doorway and gesturing into the room. 

“Oh, I don’t want to intrude.” Yuuri hesitates, his eyes staring at his feet so hard that Victor worries he’ll bore a hole through the carpet if he stares much more. 

“It’s no trouble, really.” Victor gestures again and Yuuri accepts, making his way into the room. 

Unsure of where to go, Yuuri stands in the middle of the room, while Victor slides up onto the bed to sit. 

“You can sit down,” Victor says. He points to the chair and Yuuri turns to look at it and then back at Victor. 

“That’s alright. Thank you,” Yuuri says. 

A familiar silence creeps its ways into the room and Victor feels a sense of comfort wash over him like he’s been in this exact situation with this exact person before. He knows that those other moments were dreams, deep down he knows, but that doesn’t stop him from leaning on them as real like he knows that if he gives Yuuri enough space, he will start talking again. So, Victor does. He waits and sure enough, Yuuri speaks. 

“I...I…”

“What is it?” Victor asks, soft and encouraging, knowing that what comes next will be important. Yuuri looks flustered and Victor can’t help, but think it’s the most adorable thing he’s ever seen.  

“This was a dumb idea,” Yuuri mutters, a bright red taking over his face. “I’m sorry.” His voice slightly louder, obviously meant for Victor to hear, though he heard both statements. 

Victor slides down off of the bed and makes his way over, reaching for Yuuri’s hands once he’s within arm's distance. His hands are a little dry, but that can only be expected from spending so much time in an ice rink, and it is winter, so that’s not helping either, but Victor doesn’t care. There’s a spark of electricity that burns between them the moment takes Yuuri’s hand and it only encourages him further. 

“You clearly came here for something. What is it Yuuri?” Victor says, bringing Yuuri’s hands to his lips and kissing them gently. He’s wanted to do this with the boy in his dreams for so long, but the boy had always vanished the moment Victor tried to get more intimate with him. He’s not going to let this one get away. 

“I...can I…” He bites his lower lip and then takes a deep breath. “I’ve admired you for a really long time. You’re an amazing skater.” 

Victor wants to say that he dreams about him, but he stops himself before the words can manifest. He doesn’t want to send Yuuri running and he doesn’t want Yuuri to think he’s crazy. Instead, he settles for, running his fingers over Yuuri’s knuckles, hoping that he doesn’t pull away as his dream eventually would. “So are you,” he says.

‘Th--thank you. Ummm...I just…” He stutters, and then leans into Victor, reaching up and pressing his lips against Victor’s, chaste and nervous, and Victor is delighted by this outcome. He can feel his cheeks tingeing red. 

When Yuuri pulls away, Victor gasps softly, and then Yuuri’s face crumbles and he pulls further away from Victor’s grasp. “I’m so sorry,” he blurts out. “I don’t know what came over me. I’m...I’m...I’m so sorry.” 

“It’s ok,” Victor says, reaching out for Yuuri’s hands again. “Really.” 

“You’re sure?” Yuuri looks up to meet Victor’s eyes. 

“Yes, absolutely,” Victor says.

And that’s all the acknowledgment that Yuuri needs. Victor pulls him in again and presses their lips together in a kiss that breathes fire and lightning and Yuuri lets him, returning the kiss with just as much energy. Victor wraps his arms around Yuuri and pulls him as close as they can possibly be, letting him feel the start of his erection through his pajama bottoms, and then he carefully walks them toward the bed. He lets his knees hit the back of the bed and falls backward, taking Yuuri with him. 

“You’re gorgeous,” Victor purrs when they part and Yuuri’s cheeks take on another shade of red. He runs a hand through Yuuri’s hair and then helps the two of them scoot further up on the bed, pulling Yuuri closer once they settle, Victor nuzzling into Yuuri’s hair, breathing deeply.

“This...this is not how I saw my night going,” Yuuri mumbles, but he’s not quiet enough for Victor not to hear. 

“What were you expecting?” Victor whispers in Yuuri’s ear. He’s moved down to nipping gently at Yuuri’s ear. 

“I don’t know. Not this,” Yuuri whispers back. 

“Should I stop?” Victor pauses, pulling away and looking at Yuuri, who is pulling on his bottom lip with his teeth. 

“No,” he says. “No.” 

Victor smiles. It’s exactly what he wants to hear. “Ok.” 

He flips Yuuri over, straddling him, and runs a hand through Yuuri’s hair. He smiles and dips down to kiss Yuuri and Yuuri responds, reaching up to meet Victor for the kiss. He runs one of his hands down Yuuri’s chest, finally coming to rest of his very pressing erection. The moment his hand makes contact, Yuuri breaks the kiss and moans into Victor’s mouth. Victor smiles and reaches down beginning to undo Yuuri’s belt with his free hand. 

“Let me know if you want me to stop,” Victor says, hesitating before undoing the belt in its entirety. “Seriously. It’s not a problem if you don’t want to do anything.” 

“Keep going,” Yuuri moans in response and so Victor does. He sits up straighter and pulls Yuuri’s belt free from his jeans, Yuuri tilting his hips up to give Victor room to pull his belt away. Then, he quickly unbuttons the button and pulls the zip down. Yuuri moans and Victor can’t help the stupid smile that takes over his face. He slowly peels Yuuri’s pants down and when Yuuri lifts his hips again, he pulls them from his legs, leaving Yuuri in only his boxers, his navy blue boxers. 

Victor bites his lower lips as he takes in the mess of Yuuri beneath him. Yuuri is flushed from head to toe and his cock is straining against the fabric. Oh, how Victor wants to have that in his mouth right at this very moment. He takes a deep breath and settles himself and then bends down and places another kiss on Yuuri’s lips and though Yuuri tries to draw more from the kiss, Victor pulls away and begins placing kisses down his stomach, stopping just above Yuuri’s waistband. 

“Please, don’t stop,” Yuuri whispers, voice quivering and eyes shut.

Victor smiles. “Ok.” Then, he tugs lightly on the waistband of Yuuri’s boxers and slides them carefully down his hips, watching as Yuuri’s cock springs free from the fabric and lays itself upon Yuuri’s stomach. He tosses the boxers over his shoulder and doesn’t bother to check where they’ve landed, his sole focus on Yuuri.

He takes a deep breath and then wrap his fingers around Yuuri’s dick and run his hand down and then back up, circling his hand around the head upon his return, spreading pre-cum down the length as his hand makes another move down, eliciting soft moans from Yuuri. 

The anticipation is pooling in his stomach, Victor can feel it burning and churning like lava. He stops his hands’ continuous up and down motion for a moment and slips off the bed to grab some condoms and bottle of lube from the inside pocket of his suitcase. He places the lube on the hotel nightstand, and then tears open one the condom packets and carefully rolls it down Yuuri’s length and then immediately leans down and takes him in his mouth, humming contently around Yuuri’s cock as Yuuri lets out the most wanton moan Victor has ever heard (and he’s heard Chris), and it sends a spike of utter want straight to his own cock. 

He sucks carefully, but with some force and slowly moves back to the head of Yuuri’s dick, swirling his tongue around the tip before he starts down again. This is something he’s only fantasized about and now here he is. He’s a little lightheaded, like the first time he won a gold medal, and he loves the feeling. He continues sucking and teasing, alternating using his mouth and stroking with his hand until Yuuri is a panting, stuttering mess beneath him and Victor sees his balls start to tense as if he’s going to come. 

“Not yet,” Victor whispers, voice hoarse as he pulls off of Yuuri’s cock. 

“Victor,” Yuuri pants. “Please. I…” 

“I know. But...I want to be inside of you...if that’s ok,” Victor says, pulling away from Yuuri. 

Yuuri arches off the bed, chasing the fleeting feeling of Victor’s hands on him. “Fuck. Yes. Please. Yes.” 

Victor reaches for the lube that he placed on the nightstand and flips the cap opens, pouring a little onto his hand. He warms the liquid between his hands and then takes his finger and circles Yuuri’s hole, massaging it for a moment before he pushes his index finger in, letting Yuuri adjust. He curls his finger, moving it ever so slightly, and then pulling it out entirely before returning it inside of Yuuri. Yuuri lets out a deep breathed sigh that Victor’s wanted to hear for months and Victor smiles. He continues this pattern until he decided Yuuri is ready for a second finger, and eventually a third. 

Then, he quickly rolls a condom onto his own length, pours a little lube into his hand and gives his dick a few pumps, bringing him to full hardness. Then, he leans down and lines himself up with Yuuri. He smiles and places a small kiss on Yuuri’s lips, which Yuuri readily returns, before pushing in, slowly until he is fully engulfed in Yuuri’s warmth. 

Yuuri lets out another moan that is needier than anyone else he has ever slept with and he follows it with a groan of Victor’s name, which leaves Victor lightheaded. Sex has never felt this way and his unsure why it hasn’t, but he pushes the thought away as quickly as it arrives and returns his attention to Yuuri.

“Yes, Yuuri,” Victor moans in return. “So perfect.” 

He places another kiss on Yuuri’s lips. Then, he pulls his hips back and pushes back in, drawing another series of moans from Yuuri, and creating a slow but steady rhythm between the two of them. He thrusts into Yuuri and both of them continue with their string of “yes” and “more” mutterings, names being panted in pleasure, and unintelligible moans and gasps. 

Victor pulls out and thrusts in again, watching Yuuri’s face as he does, seeing the smile tinged at the edges of his face as lets out another stuttering gasp. This competition has turned out better than he expected. 

“Victor,” Yuuri pants. “I’m...I’m…” 

“Yes. Yes, do it,” Victor replies, picking up the pace with his own thrusts. 

Yuuri tenses and stills, short gasps punctuating short moans, and Victor can feel him clenching down on his own cock as he fills the condom, a soft blush coloring his face. He looks just the way Victor wants him. Perfect and his. 

Victor bites his lip as he takes in the sight before him and then thrusts himself into Yuuri a few more times, milking the sounds Yuuri is making that are driving Victor wild with lust. It doesn’t take long and he finds himself stilling, panting as he comes and then collapses forward onto Yuuri. 

“That was amazing. You are amazing,” Victor says, placing a kiss on the skin of Yuuri’s stomach that he has within reach. 

Yuuri doesn’t say anything, he runs his fingers through Victor’s hair and then as far as he can down his back, stroking and scratching in the most comforting manner Victor has ever experienced. 

After a few moments, he pulls himself free from Yuuri and pulls the condom off, tying it at the top, tossing it vaguely in the direction of the hotel trash can. He’ll deal with making sure it’s actually in the trash can in the morning, he decides. He sees Yuuri remove the one he’s wearing as well and head toward the bathroom, shutting the door behind him. 

Victor flops down on the bed and waits for Yuuri to reemerge, letting his mind, which is clouding up with sleep, think about how this couldn’t possibly be real. When Yuuri returns to the room, he starts to look for his clothing, but Victor reaches out to stop him. 

“No,” Victor says. “Stay with me.” 

Yuuri looks up at him with something that resembles confusion in his eyes, but he nods. “Ok,” he says as he slides onto the bed next to Victor. 

Victor pulls him close and he can feel Yuuri relax into his arms before he feels sleep come to take him. And if Yuuri slips out of bed and out of Victor’s hotel room in the middle of the night, Victor doesn’t wake up or stir. He sleeps without any dreams or nightmares for the first time in months. He sleeps through the soft steps that Yuuri makes, and the small click of the door unlatching and them shutting, content in his satiated state and believing his dream boy is still snuggled against him. He sleeps and his mind is at ease. 

When Victor wakes up in the morning, he’s alone but he doesn’t feel the same hole in his heart that he’s felt in the past. There’s something different there, Victor just doesn’t have a name for it yet.


	7. Chapter 7

The flight is long, especially when there aren’t any connecting flights back to St. Petersburg. He finds himself in the airport waiting to board his connection is Helsinki googling “Yuuri Katsuki” and reading through every article ever written and looking at every photo taken. His dream boy is real, he’s almost certain. How did he not know about Yuuri Katsuki before? 

He’s finally back in St. Petersburg and Victor wants nothing more than to crawl into his own bed and sleep for the next three days. He’s exhausted from the flight back after NHK and the feeling that he’s back in the competition where he belongs. There’s also a lingering feeling of something else that Victor isn’t sure about. He still can’t figure out why this time he feels like he’s left a part of him behind in Japan. 

He hasn’t picked up Makkachin from the kennel yet, so the apartment is quiet, which Victor finds to be a relief. One less thing for him to worry about before he crashes. After a hot shower to rid himself of the stench of being in a metal tube for hours, he pulls on his sleep pants and crawls beneath his duvet, closing his eyes and inhaling deeply, trying to relax, images of Yuuri Katsuki skating across his mind.   
  
  


 

The white walls are definitely something he recognizes, just like he recognizes the ice beneath his feet. His bare feet, which should be freezing, but aren’t. The sound of blades cutting through ice across the rink draw his attention and he turns around to see Yuuri making a three and heading into a Triple Flip. Yuuri lands it gracefully and Victor can’t help but move toward him, clapping as he does, but he stops when Yuuri notices him and stumbles, falling to the ground. 

Victor gasps and begins running across the ice, sliding slightly in the process. He falls to his knees and continues sliding coming to rest by Yuuri’s side. 

“Yuuri!” he cries. “Are you ok?” 

Yuuri lets out a sigh and lifts his head to look at Victor. “How...how do you my name?” he breathes. “What are you doing here?” 

Victor looks taken aback and he hesitates slightly. Was that not this boy’s name? “That is your name, isn’t it? Yuuri? We met at NHK.” 

Yuuri bites his bottom lip and curses. “You do remember these dreams then,” he mutters. 

“Of course,” Victor says. “I love these dreams. I always hope for them over the other nightmares...I...I wanted to see you,” he says, reaching out and waiting for Yuuri to move toward him, before pulling him fully into his lap. “I missed you.” 

“Victor,” Yuuri says, his voice small and tight. 

“What? What is it?” Victor asks, something akin to fear pooling in his belly. “What’s going on?” 

“I...I don’t know how you’re here, but we...we can’t see each other anymore,” Yuuri says, he turns away from Victor and begins to pull away. 

“What?” Victor says. He reaches out and grabs hold of Yuuri’s sleeve. “Why?” 

“Victor,” Yuuri tries to reason, but Victor just doesn’t want to hear it. 

“Tell me why? What did I do?” Victor pleads, tears threatening to spill down his face. “I thought...we connected...I...” 

“Victor let go, please…” Yuuri tries again.

“I can’t…” 

“Why?” 

“Because...what we have isn’t real,” Yuuri says finally pulling his arm free from Victor. He pushes himself up to stand upright, looking down at Victor.  “I told her it wasn’t fair and she has to stop.”

“What? Who? No, it’s not true. I love you, Yuuri,” Victor says. 

“Yes, it is. It’s not real. This is a dream. I’m a dream,” Yuuri pleads. 

“But, you’re not! I’ve met you!” Victor cries. 

Yuuri takes a deep breath and settles himself. “This is all my fault, but I can’t do this to you anymore. The lines are too blurry,” Yuuri mumbles. “You’ll forget me soon. Don’t worry.” Then, he skates toward the exit of the rink and disappears the moment he steps off the ice. 

The cold from the rink finally begins to seep into Victor’s clothes and he tries to stand, but the ice is suddenly slippery and he crashes to the ground, tears beginning to stream down his face. He smashes his fist into the ice and the sound echoes throughout the rink, but no one runs to see what the sound was. He’s alone with the soft muffled sounds of his crying. 

The rink then turns green and begins filling with smoke and the ice that was once beneath Victor disappears and is replaced by sand, the sound of the ocean soothing him. He remembers this place, Lazurnaya Bay. He takes a deep breath, the smell of the salt from the ocean washing over him and calming him. 

“I’m sorry,” a female voice says behind and he recognizes it immediately. 

“What?” Victor replies, not turning around to face the orange haired woman that he knows is standing behind him. 

“He’s stubborn sometimes,” she replies. “And I can’t change that. He is the master.” 

Victor nods and then takes a deep breath, walking toward the water. He dips his toes in and it feels pleasant and warm, he smiles, looking up at the dark night sky and the stars, remembering the night all those years ago where he did the same thing and let Ilia disappear from his heart. But, the feeling of relief that had washed over him that night doesn’t come. Instead, his heart only constricts in pain as thoughts of Yuuri cross his mind. 

“Why are you here?” Victor whispers, hand coming to clutch over his heart. 

“To take away the pain,” she replies, walking toward him. 

“How can you take away this pain? He doesn’t want me!” Victor cries. 

She smiles as she reaches him and places her hand slowly on his shoulder. “May your desire fade along with the memories.” 

Victor turns to look at her, a warmth seeping into his body, and she vanishes almost the moment he does. The waves begin to lap at his feet and soon the water turns frigid, forcing Victor back to the sand. He looks around at the empty beach and screams, a release of some of the emotions he’s holding onto. It doesn’t make him feel better. Instead, he feels light headed and quickly passes out in the sand.

  
  
  


The pillow is plastered to his face the moment he regains consciousness, a large wet spot from where he was drooling on it, very visible as he pulls himself away. He reaches for his phone on the bedside table and scrolls through the contacts, finding Chris almost immediately. He doesn’t know what time it is and he honestly doesn’t care. This dream had felt so much more real than the others and he doesn’t like the aching of his heart that still feels very real and raw the more he thinks about it. 

“Victor,” Chris says the moment he answers the phone. His voice is soft and gentle like he knows something that Victor doesn’t yet and it immediately sets Victor on edge. 

“Hello Chris,” Victor says. “I just needed to talk to someone.” 

“So you saw the news then,” Chris says. 

“What news?” Victor responds, holding the emotions he was about to pour out in front of Chris in check. 

“About your latest obsession, Yuuri Katsuki,” Chris starts. 

“He’s...he’s gone isn’t he,” Victor says, emotion draining from his voice. 

“Yes,” Chris replies. “He withdrew from the rest of the series this morning. He’s retiring.” 

“Fuck!” Victor breathes, a tight knot caught in the middle of his chest. His breath hitches and every breath after that is short and sharp. 

“Are you ok?” Chris asks, worry creeping into his voice. 

“No,” Victor replies, and he feels a pain in his chest that he hasn’t felt in a very long time. It’s worse than when Ilia left him and reminds him of his very first competitions where he swore his heart separated. He hangs up the phone before Chris can even take a moment to say “goodbye”. Chris tries to call him back several times, but he just lets them roll to voicemail. 

He’s supposed to go to the rink for practice, but he can’t bring himself to move from the fetal position he’s curled into on the floor. Yakov calls his phone, but he sends it straight to voicemail, which is then followed by several texts demanding that he get himself to the rink immediately. He doesn’t want to listen to his coach telling him that he’s making up the pain. Instead, he tries to will himself to sleep, but as has been the case for months, it doesn’t come. 

When Victor does finally start to doze off, it’s nearly three in the morning and he’s been lying on the floor for at least eight hours. He never truly falls asleep. His eyes shoot open at the first noise that isn’t a standard one and he finds sitting in the chair across from his bed is the orange haired woman wearing a black robe. He stares at her, rubbing his eyes to make sure he’s actually seeing her. 

“You,” he says staring at her with wide eyes. 

She looks him up and down, her eyes gleaming in the moonlight from the bedroom window, she looks almost cat-like. “Me.” 

“What are you doing here?” He demands. 

She smiles. “I’ve come to see you.” 

“Why? Why are you looking for me?!” Victor screams, he recoils the moment the words leave his mouth, scared that his neighbors will hear. 

“It was only supposed to be a short visit. You weren’t even supposed to see,” she says. 

“Yeah, well that would have been hard since I’m don’t sleep,” he says, fisting his hands in the duvet. “I just…” 

Her eyes narrow. “You what?” 

“Nothing.” 

“What?” She growls, standing up and for the first time she resembles the fox spirit that she is, sharp nails and teeth and eyes focused like she’s hunting something. 

Victor inhales sharply. “I...I miss him.” He looks away.

“That’s not possible,” she says stepping closer to the bed. “I removed the spell. You shouldn’t be in love with him anymore. It should be instantaneous.” 

“You did a shit job, then,” Victor cries, tears beginning to fall down his face. 

“It’s...it’s not my magic. I can’t undo this,” the woman replies and for the first time, Victor sees the panic in her eyes. “I’m sorry.” 

“What? What am I supposed to do then?” Victor slams his fist into the mattress. 

“I...I don’t know. I’m sorry. I have to get back,” the woman says again, and then almost as seamlessly as she entered, she vanishes. 

Victor screams and smashes his hands into his mattress, tears streaming down his face. “No!” 

When his sobs have started to calm down, Victor reaches for his phone and dials a number he knows automatically. 

“Hello?” Chris says on the other end of the line. “Victor, oh thank god! I was worried sick about you! What do you need? I can call Georgi and Yakov. Just don’t do anything stupid. Please.” 

“I need to find him, Chris. My heart feels like it’s breaking,” Victor says. 

“From a one night stand? Victor, that sounds crazy…” 

“You have to help me,” Victor says, his voice cracking as he pleads. “I can’t explain it, but I need him.” 

“Victor…” 

“I feel like my heart is exploding, please…” Victor sniffles and he can feel more tears streaming down his face. 

There’s a silence that hangs over them on the phone, while Victor waits for Chris to decide on whether he wants to help or not. Finally, he says, “Ok. What do you want me to do?” 


	8. Chapter 8

The airport is Detroit is large and as Victor makes his way to baggage claim, he can feel his heart beating steadily in his chest and he’s afraid that if he isn’t careful, it’ll beat out of his chest. He stands at the baggage carousel, wearing his sunglasses, and the world moves around him. No one stops to talk to him or ask him for his autograph, and if anyone stares and recognizes him, they don’t bother to approach. 

He gets into a cab outside of the airport and gives the man an address that Chris had found for him using all of his skating friends. And when he finally arrives at the rink, dragging his suitcase behind him, he can feel the call of the ice before he walks through the door. He feels calm. He doesn’t even know if Yuuri will be at the rink, but it doesn’t matter.

“Excuse me, sir! You can’t go in there, it’s a private session!” The blonde woman behind the front desk calls after him as he ignores her entirely and makes his way rinkside. 

The moment he sees Yuuri on the ice, doing nothing but figure eights by himself, poorly he doesn’t fail to notice, with no one else around, he pauses and his heart moves into his throat. He opens his mouth to call out, but nothing escapes. 

He watches as Yuuri does back crossovers and starts a layback spin before coming to rest with his arms outstretched toward the sky. The expression on his face is one of surprise as if he hadn’t expected to complete the spin. He knows that feeling; relates to it. He needs to speak to Yuuri. Victor tries to call out again, but can’t. Instead, he drops his suitcase and runs as far as he can out onto the ice, not noticing that he isn’t wearing his skates and that he’s sliding most of the way.

“Victor,” Yuuri starts, his voice soft and shaky, when he looks over to see the man scrambling toward him. He looks around at the rink. “What are you doing here?” 

“What am I doing here? I’m...I’m here because this is where you are, Yuuri. I promise it’s not one our dreams,” Victor responds, a smile tugging at his lips. “And I don’t want to be anywhere else.” 

“You shouldn’t be here. You should be home in Russia. Preparing for Rostelecom. It’s in two weeks and you’re here,” Yuuri says. He’s staring down at his shoes now, ignoring Victor. 

Victor huffs. “Well, I would be and I don’t plan on staying long. But, you see. The thing is...I need you and I needed to tell you in person.” 

Yuuri stares at him, eyes wide, but no other emotion showing on his face. “What?” 

“Was that not English? Let me try again. We seem to have a mutual friend,” he starts. 

“But, but…” Yuuri tries to reason. “She said…” 

“That she took the spell off? I know, she told me. I’m not sure what she’s talking about, but..” 

“She’s talking about the love spell,” Yuuri interrupts. 

“What?”

Yuuri sighs. “She owes me a debt and she tried to pay it with you...with a love spell cast on you.”  

Victor nods. “I see. Apparently, this isn’t her magic though.” 

“Then what is it? Why are you here?” 

Victor shrugs. “Because I need to be. My feelings for you are very real. I can’t get you out of my mind and even the short amount of time that we actually were together in person was the best I have felt in ten years. And for the first time, in months I finally feel like my old self again. But to be honest, does it matter? Yuuri, I think I love you and I’d like to give...whatever this is...love, I think...a try. If you’ll have me, that is.” 

“I...I…” Yuuri stutters. 

“You don’t have to say yes right now, but if you feel the same, I’ve left you tickets for Rostelecom. I would love for you to be there,” Victor says, his smile soft. The mobile phone in his jacket pocket rings, ruining the moment of calm between them. He pulls it from his pocket to see Yakov calling. “I...I have to go. Just think about what I said.” 

Yuuri nods and Victor turns away, leaving behind the ice and with it all of his hope. He feels lighter somehow, even with Yakov yelling at him on the other side of the phone call.

  
  
  


Yakov had yelled at him when he arrived at the airport, and Victor nodded and agreed with everything Yakov said, causing Yakov to pause, and the memory of that moment causes Victor to laugh.    


“What’s so funny? You should be practicing,” Yakov mutters at him. “One good competition amidst a dreadful season is nothing to laugh about.”

“I know,” Victor says. “I think Rostelecom is going to be great.” 

“It better be. Sponsors may pull your funding if you don’t do well in this competition,” Yakov says before leaving Victor alone to finish stretching out in the locker room. 

When Victor’s turn to skate in the short program finally arrives, he doesn’t feel any nerves like he has in his previous competitions. Instead, the calm he felt the last time Yuuri was around when he skated takes over his body. He smiles and begins scanning the audience as he takes the ice. He wants to look around, maybe catch a glimpse of Yuuri in the crowd, but he doesn’t see anyone and his heart begins to plummet, but it doesn’t ache.

The announcer calls his name again, pulling him from his own head. He’s about to give up hope that Yuuri has flown all the way to Russia, but then he spots bright orange hair in the very back of the audience and he knows. It’s her. Yuuri is with her. He breathes a sigh of relief and takes his opening position on the ice, arms wrapped tightly around himself. 

The music fills the rink and Victor pulls his arms up around his body and over his head and brings them down open palmed in front of him, his eyes looking toward the ceiling of the stadium. He pushes off with a few strong forward strokes and extends his left leg up into a spiral, extending his hand back to help hold it. 

He releases the spiral and uses his back crossovers to pick up some speed, coming around to a spread eagle before jumping the first jump of his program, a Triple Axel. He can feel as he holds his breath as he takes off from the spread eagle position. The moment his foot leaves the ice, he doesn’t think of anything. He just feels like this is what he loves about the ice and then, his blade makes contact with the ice, landing cleanly and the crowd cheers louder than they have for months for him. 

He breathes, a smile appearing on his face, and he progresses into some twizzles followed by another jump, this time a Quad Lutz, which he lands cleanly as well. The adrenaline buzzes through him as he starts his step sequence before completing several more jumps, a Quad Flip-Triple Salchow combination followed quickly by a Quad Loop. 

His heart is beating so fast, he can feel it pulsing in time with the music and lunges across the ice before pulling up and setting up for a Quad Flip, which he lands as if it were effortless, the last jump of his program finished with no issue at all. He moves into a flying sit spin and the finishes by bringing his arms up toward the ceiling, his face staring down at the ice and when he looks up, staring at him from the very back of the stands is Yuuri Katsuki. He takes a deep breath and falls to the ground in tears. 

He pulls himself up from the ground and bows to the audience before skating toward the exit and rushing into the Kiss and Cry, bypassing Yakov who follows him into the Kiss and Cry rolling his eyes. Victor, however, is oblivious to him. He can’t stop and take his eyes off of Yuuri Katsuki, sitting in the stands. 

He almost misses the score as he’s so focused on making sure Yuuri doesn’t leave, but Yakov pulls him into a hug once it’s announced, which startles Victor. 64.75. It’s his highest this season and he feels like he’s going to medal. 

When he leaves the Kiss and Cry, he doesn’t even bother to change out of his skates, he checks to make sure the guards are secure and then begins sprinting as hard as he can toward the audience, even as the next skater takes the ice. 

“Yuuri!” He calls quietly once he’s within shouting distance of the boy, startling Yuuri. Victor can’t help but laugh at the boy. 

“Victor,” Yuuri responds, coming down from his seat hidden in the back of the arena as quickly as he can.

“You came!” Victor says once Yuuri is within arms reach. He rushes and pulls Yuuri into his arms. “I didn’t think you would.” 

Yuuri blushes, pulling his bottom lip into his mouth. “I wasn’t going to,” he says. “But, then I started having nightmares and not being able to sleep.” 

“My poor Yuuri…” 

“Vichan says we wished for each other so it canceled out her fox magic and the nightmares are me trying to find you.”...,” Yuuri says, burying his head into Victor’s neck. 

Victor nods. “I see,” he says. “I remember that. I did wish for you. Maybe not you specifically, but someone who wouldn’t break my heart,” Victor says, smiling. “A long time ago. But, then...how come I only just started to have the nightmares.”

“Sometimes magic and wishes wait for the right moment,” a female voice that Victor now knows to be Vichan says. Victor looks over his shoulder to see her leaning on the wall. “You were more open to them after your fall. I’m sure my spell helped a little.” She smirks. 

Victor laughs, turning his attention back to Yuuri who is still snug in his arms. “I’m glad I found you.” 

“Me too,” says Yuuri. Then he pulls back from Victor slightly, looking him in the eyes.  “You’re going to be great in the Free Skate tomorrow.” 

Victor laughs. “Only if you’re here.” 

“I...I don’t plan on going anywhere,” Yuuri responds, a blush creeping up on his cheeks. 

“Good,” Victor says. “I’m glad.” Then, he pulls Yuuri into a kiss that feels like sparks are flying around wildly in his chest. He wouldn’t it any other way. 

This isn’t the story of Victor’s rise to glory and fame for Russia. This is a story of him finding happiness, which as fate would have it aren’t the same in his case. No, Victor Nikiforov’s story of finding happiness begins when Victor is twenty-one and breaks his ankle. 


End file.
